Asynchronous

From Business Continuity Management (BCM) and Disaster Recovery (DR) Wiki Glossary

1. Asynchronous is a variable or random time interval between successive characters, blocks, operations, or events. Asynchronous data transmission provides variable inter-character time but fixed inter-bit time within characters. Related Term: Replication, Asynchronous Replication, Synchronous BCMBoK Competency Level BCMBoK 4: Recovery Strategy CL 4: Intermediate (DR)

(Source: Business Continuity Management Institute - BCM Institute)

2. In a communication sense,the ability to transmit each character as a self-contained unit of information,without additional timing information.This method of transmitting data is sometimes called start/stop.Synchronous working involves the use of timing information to allow transmission of data which is normally done in blocks.Synchronous transmission is usually more efficient than the asynchronous method.

(Source: OGC, Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) v3)