21-letter words containing a, b, l, e, r
- distributed smalltalk — ["The Design and Implementation of Distributed Smalltalk", J. Bennett, SIGPLAN Notices 22(12):318-330 (Dec 1980)].
- double predestination — the doctrine that God has foreordained both those who will be saved and those who will be damned.
- double spanish burton — a tackle having one standing block and two running blocks, giving a mechanical advantage of five, neglecting friction.
- empire state building — New York City skyscraper
- empirical probability — a measure or estimate of the degree of confidence one may have in the occurrence of an event, defined as the proportion observed in a sample
- epidermolysis bullosa — type of genetic skin disorder
- equiangular hyperbola — a hyperbola with transverse and conjugate axes equal to each other.
- european central bank — the central bank of the European Union, established in 1998 to oversee the process of European Monetary Union and subsequently to direct monetary policy within the countries using the euro
- extensible vax editor — (text, tool) (EVE) A DEC product implemented using DEC's Text Processing Utility (TPU).
- faculty board meeting — a meeting of the governing body of a faculty
- federal reserve board — a U.S. federal banking system that is under the control of a central board of governors (Federal Reserve Board) with a central bank (Federal Reserve Bank) in each of 12 districts and that has wide powers in controlling credit and the flow of money as well as in performing other functions, as regulating and supervising its member banks.
- franco-belgian system — French system.
- garbageabetical order — (humour) 1. The result of using an insertion sort to merge data into an unsorted list. 2. The state of any file or list that is supposed to be sorted, but is not.
- gas blanketed storage — Gas blanketed storage is the use of gas to fill empty space in a storage tank.
- generic type variable — (programming) (Also known as a "schematic type variable"). Different occurrences of a generic type variable in a type expression may be instantiated to different types. Thus, in the expression let id x = x in (id True, id 1) id's type is (for all a: a -> a). The universal quantifier "for all a:" means that a is a generic type variable. For the two uses of id, a is instantiated to Bool and Int. Compare this with let id x = x in let f g = (g True, g 1) in f id This looks similar but f has no legal Hindley-Milner type. If we say f :: (a -> b) -> (b, b) this would permit g's type to be any instance of (a -> b) rather than requiring it to be at least as general as (a -> b). Furthermore, it constrains both instances of g to have the same result type whereas they do not. The type variables a and b in the above are implicitly quantified at the top level: f :: for all a: for all b: (a -> b) -> (b, b) so instantiating them (removing the quantifiers) can only be done once, at the top level. To correctly describe the type of f requires that they be locally quantified: f :: ((for all a: a) -> (for all b: b)) -> (c, d) which means that each time g is applied, a and b may be instantiated differently. f's actual argument must have a type at least as general as ((for all a: a) -> (for all b: b)), and may not be some less general instance of this type. Type variables c and d are still implicitly quantified at the top level and, now that g's result type is a generic type variable, any types chosen for c and d are guaranteed to be instances of it. This type for f does not express the fact that b only needs to be at least as general as the types c and d. For example, if c and d were both Bool then any function of type (for all a: a -> Bool) would be a suitable argument to f but it would not match the above type for f.
- george bryan brummell — George Bryan II, Beau Brummell.
- give sb a green light — If someone in authority gives you a green light, they give you permission to do something.
- goldbach's conjecture — the conjecture that every even number greater than two is the sum of two prime numbers
- hierarchical database — (database) A kind of database management system that links records together like a family tree such that each record type has only one owner, e.g. an order is owned by only one customer. Hierarchical structures were widely used in the first mainframe database management systems. However, due to their restrictions, they often cannot be used to relate structures that exist in the real world.
- hildegard (of bingen) — Saint(1098-1179); Ger. nun, composer, & mystic: her day is Sept. 17
- hindu-arabic numerals — Arabic numeral.
- horizontal stabilizer — the horizontal surface, usually fixed, of an aircraft empennage, to which the elevator is hinged.
- hyperbolic paraboloid — a paraboloid that can be put into a position such that its sections parallel to one coordinate plane are hyperbolas, with its sections parallel to the other two coordinate planes being parabolas.
- imprecise probability — (probability) A probability that is represented as an interval (as opposed to a single number) included in [0,1].
- international brigade — a military force that fought on the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War, consisting of volunteers (predominantly socialists and communists) from many countries
- intersubstitutability — a person or thing acting or serving in place of another.
- irish republican army — an underground Irish nationalist organization founded to work for Irish independence from Great Britain: declared illegal by the Irish government in 1936, but continues activity aimed at the unification of the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Abbreviation: IRA, I.R.A.
- jobseeker's allowance — (in Britain) a National Insurance or social security payment for unemployed people; replaced unemployment benefit in 1996
- joseph bonaparte gulf — an inlet of the Timor Sea in N Australia. Width: 360 km (225 miles)
- keep the ball rolling — a spherical or approximately spherical body or shape; sphere: He rolled the piece of paper into a ball.
- laboratory technician — sb who assists in a laboratory
- lady macbeth strategy — a strategy in a takeover battle in which a third party makes a bid acceptable to the target company, appearing to act as a white knight but subsequently joining forces with the original (unwelcome) bidder
- lambeth quadrilateral — the four essentials agreed upon at the Lambeth Conference of 1888 for a United Christian Church, namely, the Holy Scriptures, the Apostles' Creed, the sacraments of baptism and Holy Communion, and the historic episcopate
- language-based editor — language-sensitive editor
- lap and shoulder belt — a car seat belt
- league of arab states — Arab League.
- leave sb in the lurch — If someone leaves you in the lurch, they go away or stop helping you at a very difficult time.
- liability engineering — the practice by a company of taking steps to avoid liability for any fraudulent dealings with it, such as making a credit-card owner responsible for any abuses of the card by a third party
- like a blue-arsed fly — in a state of frenzied activity
- long-term liabilities — Long-term liabilities are debts that a company does not have to pay back for a year or more.
- magnetic permeability — permeability (def 2).
- magnificent riflebird — a bird of paradise, Craspedophora magnifica
- maître d'hôtel butter — melted butter mixed with parsley and lemon juice
- male pattern baldness — a pattern of hair loss in males, dependent on the presence of the androgenic hormone testoterone, in which the scalp hair eventually covers only the back of the head and temples.
- male-pattern baldness — inherited baldness characterized by the gradual loss of hair from the front or top of the head
- maple-leaved viburnum — dockmackie.
- marketable securities — Marketable securities are securities that can easily be sold quickly on the open market.
- negotiable instrument — order or promise to pay money
- negotiable securities — securities that are legally transferable in title from one party to another
- nellis air force base — the largest air base in the U.S. Air Force's Tactical Air Command, located near Las Vegas, Nev., and developed from what began in 1941 as a U.S. Army Air Corps field.