A narrow notch or opening, as in a keyway in machinery or a slot for coins in a vending machine. Also used: to place something into a slot; to fit something into a slot. For example, The car seat belt slotted easily into the slot.
In sports, a slot is an open receiver in the middle of the field who can make quick cuts and run shorter routes (like slants or quick outs) that stretch the defense. These players are becoming more prominent in the NFL, with Tyreek Hill and Brandin Cooks being some of the most recent examples. They can be effective at racking up yards and touchdowns because they can create separation with their speed and make the defense think twice about covering them.
In software, a slot is a type of data that BigQuery assigns to a query at each execution time. It is important to understand how slots are defined and managed because a number of slot properties are critical when working with offer management panels. For more information about slot properties, see the Using Slots chapter of the ATG Personalization Programming Guide. Slots are a key component of ATG’s dynamic DAG and play a significant role in providing capacity management. Whenever the capacity demands on a query change, BigQuery automatically evaluates the available slots and allocates or pauzes them as needed. This ensures that queries get the resources they need without being starved of slots.