Timethrough

Timethrough is a term used in some technical and academic contexts to denote the amount of time a process, operation, or system takes to pass from its starting point to its end point. It functions as a time-oriented counterpart to throughput, focusing on duration rather than volume of work completed. Because timethrough is not standardized across disciplines, its precise meaning varies by domain.

In computing and digital signal processing, timethrough may describe the end-to-end latency through a pipeline, including all processing stages and buffers. In manufacturing and logistics, it can refer to the total time required to move a unit from the initial setup to completion. In media and interactive applications, timethrough can denote the time required for a sequence to progress or for an effect to render. The common thread is a focus on elapsed time from start to finish rather than the quantity of work accomplished.

Measurement is typically the elapsed time between defined start and end events, expressed in seconds or minutes. Some contexts use a timethrough ratio, actual duration divided by a nominal or target duration, to evaluate performance. A lower timethrough suggests quicker end-to-end progression, while a higher value may indicate bottlenecks or inefficiencies. Timethrough is related to, but distinct from, latency (delay before first output), cycle time, and throughput (work completed per time unit).

The term is informal in many areas and has not achieved universal standardization. Its meaning should be inferred from context, and when results are presented, start and end criteria used to compute timethrough should be explicitly defined. See also: throughput, latency, cycle time, end-to-end delay, time-to-completion.