hourglass

noun

1. A clock made of two glass vessels connected by a narrow passage through which sand flows.

   “After each game turn, invert the hourglass to reset the time limit for the next player.”

   “The sands of thy short life are spent this hour, / And no hand in the universe can turn / Thy hourglass, if these gummed leaves be burnt / Ere thou canst mount up these immortal steps.”

2. A cursor, often shaped like an hourglass, indicating that the computer is busy.

   “When I right click the desktop display to check Display Properties, it hangs and shows me only the hourglass instead of the display menu.”

verb

1. (intransitive)To display the cursor as an hourglass indicating that the computer is busy or processing.

   “I have an ADP that I use for reporting that I have used for about a year. I only use it every 3 months, and it has worked up until now. This morning I tried using it, but after trying to open the report, it hourglassed and then showed a "Timeout expired" error. I searched this message and found out how to set the timeout limit, and set it to 300 seconds. Still the same message.”