silo

Etymology

From Spanish silo, of unclear origin. See Spanish silo for more.

noun

1. (agriculture) A vertical building, usually cylindrical, used for the production of silage.
2. (agriculture) from the shape, a building used for the storage of grain.
3. (military) An underground bunker used to hold missiles which may be launched.
   As a rule of thumb, to reliably destroy a hardened missile silo or communications bunker, a one megaton warhead should land within a 600 foot radius of its target. This will ensure that the enemy silo lies within the crater gouged out by the nuclear blast. 1987, Michio Kaku, Daniel Axelrod, To Win a Nuclear War: The Pentagon's Secret War Plans, Black Rose Books Ltd., page 203
4. (derogatory, management) An organizational unit that has poor interaction with other units, negatively affecting overall performance.
   A silo is created when members in one department or function do not interact with those in another department, even though there might be operational benefits to the interaction. 2006, Albert J. Mills, Jean C. Helms Mills, John Bratton, Organizational Behaviour in a Global Context, page 116
   Graeme Bickerdike, a member of campaign organisation The HRE Group, told RAIL: "This infilling and demolition programme - costing much more than repair - has been conceived with no thought for its impact beyond the silos where distant, unaccountable officials manage their spreadsheets. May 5 2021, Tony Streeter, “Network News: Disused structures "assets to be preserved", say MPs”, in RAIL, number 930, page 23
5. (derogatory, informatics) A structure in the information system that is poorly networked with other structures, with data exchange hampered.
   Our networking is organized in silos, and employees lose time manually transferring data.
6. (derogatory, slang) A self-enclosed group of like-minded individuals.
7. (computing) In Microsoft Windows operating systems, a kernel object for isolating groups of threads.

verb

1. (transitive) To store in a silo.
2. (transitive) To separate; to isolate.