interrupt

verb

1. (ambitransitive)To disturb or halt (an ongoing process or action, or the person performing it) by interfering suddenly, especially by speaking.

   “A maverick politician repeatedly interrupted the debate by shouting.”

   “Do not interrupt me in my course.”

   “One saint's day in mid-term a certain newly appointed suffragan-bishop came to the school chapel, and there preached on “The Inner Life.” He at once secured attention by his informal method, and when presently the coughing of Jarvis […] interrupted the sermon, he altogether captivated his audience with a remark about cough lozenges being cheap and easily procurable.”

2. (transitive)To divide; to separate; to break the monotony of.

   “The evenness of the road was not interrupted by a single hill.”

3. (transitive)To assert to (a computer) that an exceptional condition must be handled.

   “The packet receiver circuit interrupted the microprocessor.”

noun

1. An event that causes a computer or other device to temporarily cease what it was doing and attend to a condition.

   “The interrupt caused the packet handler routine to run.”