suite

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A staff of attendants or followers; a retinue.
2. n. A group of related things intended to be used together; a set.
3. n. A set of matching furniture: a dining room suite.
4. n. A series of connected rooms used as a living unit.
5. n. Music An instrumental composition, especially of the 17th or 18th century, consisting of a succession of dances in the same or related keys.
6. n. Music An instrumental composition consisting of a series of varying movements or pieces.
7. n. Computer Science A group of software products packaged and sold together, usually having a consistent look and feel, a common installation, and shared macros.
8. n. Computer Science A group of procedures that work cooperatively: The TCP/IP suite of protocols includes FTP and Telnet.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. An obsolete form of suit (in various senses).
2. n. A company of attendants or followers; retinue; train: as, the suite of an ambassador.
3. n. A number of things taken collectively and constituting a sequence or following in a series; a set; a collection of things of like kind and intended to be used together: as, a suite of rooms; a suite of furniture.
4. n. A sequel.
5. n. In music, a set or series of instrumental dances, either in the same or in related keys, usually preceded by a prelude, and variously grouped so as to secure variety and contrast. Suites were the earliest form of instrumental work in detached movements, and continued in favor from the beginning of the seventeenth to the end of the eighteenth century, though sometimes known by other names. They inclnded a great variety of dances, notably the allemande, courant, saraband, and gigue, together with the gavotte, passepied, branle, and minuet. The early suite was not fully distinguishable from the early sonata, and the developed suite finally gave place to the modern sonata, though the true sonata form as a method of construction did not belong to the suite. Suites are properly for a single instrument, like the harpsichord or clavichord, but are sometimes written for an orchestra. The suite form has lately been revived. Among modern writers of orchestral music in suite form are Lachner, Raff, Bizet, Dvořák, and Moszkowski.
6. See suit.

Wiktionary

1. n. A retinue or company of attendants, as of a distinguished personage; as, the suite of an ambassador.
2. n. A connected series or succession of objects; a number of things used or classed together; a set; as, a suite of rooms; a suite of minerals.
3. n. A group of connected rooms, usually separable from other rooms by means of access.
4. n. music a musical form, popular before the time of the sonata, consisting of a string or series of pieces all in the same key, mostly in various dance rhythms, with sometimes an elaborate prelude.
5. n. music an excerpt of instrumental music from a larger work that contains other elements besides the music; for example, the Nutcracker Suite is the music (but not the dancing) from the ballet The Nutcracker, and the Carmen Suite is the instrumental music (but not the singing and dancing) from the opera Carmen.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. A retinue or company of attendants, as of a distinguished personage. See suit, n., 5.
2. n. A connected series or succession of objects; a number of things used or clessed together; a set. See Suit, n., 6.
3. n. (Mus.) One of the old musical forms, before the time of the more compact sonata, consisting of a string or series of pieces all in the same key, mostly in various dance rhythms, with sometimes an elaborate prelude. Some composers of the present day affect the suite form.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a matching set of furniture
2. n. a musical composition of several movements only loosely connected
3. n. the group following and attending to some important person
4. n. apartment consisting of a series of connected rooms used as a living unit (as in a hotel)