task

Etymology 1

From Middle English taske (“task, tax”), from Old Northern French tasque, (compare Old French variant tasche), from Medieval Latin tasca, alteration of taxa, from Latin taxāre (“censure; charge”). Doublet of tax.

noun

1. A piece of work done as part of one’s duties.
   The employee refused to complete the assignment, arguing that it was not one of the tasks listed in her job description.
2. Any piece of work done.
   Irregular bedtimes may disrupt healthy brain development in young children, according to a study of intelligence and sleeping habits. ¶ Going to bed at a different time each night affected girls more than boys, but both fared worse on mental tasks than children who had a set bedtime, researchers found. 2013-07-19, Ian Sample, “Irregular bedtimes may affect children's brains”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 6, page 34
3. A difficult or tedious undertaking.
   As the world's drug habit shows, governments are failing in their quest to monitor every London window-box and Andean hillside for banned plants. But even that Sisyphean task looks easy next to the fight against synthetic drugs. No sooner has a drug been blacklisted than chemists adjust their recipe and start churning out a subtly different one. 2013-08-10, “A new prescription”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848
4. An objective.
5. (computing) A process or execution of a program.
   The user killed the frozen task.
6. (obsolete) A tax or charge.

verb

1. (transitive) To assign a task to, or impose a task on.
   On my first day in the office, I was tasked with sorting a pile of invoices.
   By 1966 the building was considered so unsafe that the Royal Engineers were tasked with demolishing it. May 19 2021, “Network News: HS2 unearths 900 years of history in Buckinghamshire”, in RAIL, number 931, page 23
2. (transitive) To oppress with severe or excessive burdens; to tax
3. (transitive) To charge, as with a fault.

Etymology 2

noun

1. Alternative form of taisch