Drum-Buffer-Rope

• Drum: slowest part of the process.
• Buffer: a stockpile of finished products; allows variation in production speed without starving the system.
• Rope: a rope that ties the end of the process back to the drum; it cannot proceed without output from the drum.

Ropes are supposed to signal consumption back to the drum so it knows when production must resume.

Buffers are stockpiles where things are kept to manage different production speeds or variable production outputs.