21-letter words containing a, c, r, o, n
- nitrosylsulfuric acid — a clear, straw-colored, oily, corrosive liquid, HNO 5 S, used chiefly in the manufacture of dyes.
- non-repeating decimal — a decimal representation of any irrational number, having the property that no sequence of digits is repeated ad infinitum.
- nonexamination course — a course of study in which there are no examinations
- nonproportional cover — Nonproportional cover is reinsurance cover such as excess of loss reinsurance where the reinsurer's liability is not calculated as a proportion of the insurance.
- nonrestrictive clause — a relative clause that describes or supplements but is not essential in establishing the identity of the antecedent and is usually set off by commas in English. In This year, which has been dry, is bad for crops the clause which has been dry is a nonrestrictive clause.
- nonviolent resistance — passive resistance, peaceful protest
- north atlantic treaty — the treaty (1949) signed by 12 countries, providing for the establishment of NATO.
- north pacific current — a warm current flowing eastward across the Pacific Ocean.
- not care a hang about — to not care the least bit about
- nothing in particular — not anything specific
- nuclear cross section — cross section (def 7).
- nuclear power station — a station or plant where nuclear energy is converted into heat, electricity, etc
- oblique circular cone — a cone whose surface is generated by lines joining a fixed point to the points of a circle, the fixed point lying on a line that is not perpendicular to the circle at its center.
- old spanish practices — irregular practices among a group of workers to gain increased financial allowances, reduced working hours, etc
- olympic national park — a national park in NW Washington. 1323 sq. mi. (3425 sq. km).
- open graphics library — (graphics, library) (OpenGL) A multi-platform software interface to graphics hardware, supporting rendering and imaging operations. The OpenGL interface was developed by Silicon Graphics, who license it to other vendors. The OpenGL graphics interface consists of several hundred functions operating on 2D and 3D objects, supporting basic techniques, such as modelling and smooth shading, and advanced techniques, such as texture mapping and motion blur. Many operations require a frame buffer. OpenGL is network-transparent, and a common extension to the X Window System allows an OpenGL client to communicate across a network with a different vendor's OpenGL server. OpenGL is based on Silicon Graphics' proprietary IRIS GL.
- open telecom platform — (communications, library) (OTP) A set of standard, open source libraries and tools for use with Erlang.
- open trading protocol — Internet Open Trading Protocol
- operational semantics — (theory) A set of rules specifying how the state of an actual or hypothetical computer changes while executing a program. The overall state is typically divided into a number of components, e.g. stack, heap, registers etc. Each rule specifies certain preconditions on the contents of some components and their new contents after the application of the rule. It is similar in spirit to the notion of a Turing machine, in which actions are precisely described in a mathematical way. Compuare axiomatic semantics, denotational semantics.
- orthogonal projection — a two-dimensional graphic representation of an object in which the projecting lines are at right angles to the plane of the projection. Also called orthogonal projection. Compare isometric (def 5).
- orthogonal trajectory — the locus of a point whose path cuts each curve of a family of curves at right angles.
- packed encoding rules — (protocol, standard) (PER) ASN.1 encoding rules for producing a compact transfer syntax for data structures described in ASN.1, defined in 1994. PER provides a much more compact encoding then BER. It tries to represents the data units using the minimum number of bits. The compactness requires that the decoder knows the complete abstract syntax of the data structure to be decoded, however. Documents: ITU-T X.691, ISO 8825-2.
- painter and decorator — a person who paints and decorates houses as a trade
- paradoxical intention — (in psychotherapy) the deliberate practice of a neurotic habit or thought, undertaken in order to remove it
- parasitic oscillation — (in an electronic circuit) oscillation at any undesired frequency
- partial reinforcement — the process of randomly rewarding an organism for making a response on only some of the occasions it makes it
- partition coefficient — the ratio of the concentrations of a substance in two heterogenous phases in equilibrium with each other
- path coverage testing — (testing) Testing a program by examining which lines of executable code are visited (as in code coverage testing) and also the ways of getting to each line of code and the subsequent sequence of execution. Path coverage testing is the most comprehensive type of testing that a test suite can provide. It can find more bugs, especially those that are caused by data coupling. However, path coverage is hard and usually only used for small and/or critical sections of code.
- pathfinder prospectus — a prospectus regarding the flotation of a new company that contains only sufficient details to test the market reaction
- performance appraisal — the assessment, at regular intervals, of an employee's performance at work
- performance indicator — a quantitative or qualitative measurement, or any other criterion, by which the performance, efficiency, achievement, etc of a person or organization can be assessed, often by comparison with an agreed standard or target
- performance-enhancing — noting or relating to a drug or other substance used to improve one's performance in a sport or other activity requiring strength, stamina, etc.: The use of performance-enhancing steroids by athletes is banned.
- person-to-person call — a call to a specified person; if that person cannot take the call there is no charge
- personalized medicine — an approach to the practice of medicine that uses information about a patient’s unique genetic makeup and environment to customize the patient's medical care to fit his or her individual requirements.
- phenarsazine chloride — adamsite.
- physical anthropology — the branch of anthropology dealing with the evolutionary changes in human anatomy and physiology, using mensurational and descriptive techniques.
- pick someone's brains — to obtain information or ideas from someone
- piero della francesca — Piero della [pee-air-oh del-uh;; Italian pye-raw del-lah] /piˈɛər oʊ ˈdɛl ə;; Italian ˈpyɛ rɔ ˈdɛl lɑ/ (Show IPA), (Piero dei Franceschi) c1420–92, Italian painter.
- place of articulation — the location at which two speech organs approach or come together in producing a speech sound, as in the contact of the tongue and the teeth to form a dental sound. Also called point of articulation. Compare articulator (def 2).
- play one's cards well — to use one's resources in the most effective manner
- pneumoencephalography — encephalography.
- point of articulation — place of articulation.
- polarizing microscope — a microscope that utilizes polarized light to reveal detail in an object, used especially to study crystalline and fibrous structures.
- political correctness — Political correctness is the attitude or policy of being extremely careful not to offend or upset any group of people in society who have a disadvantage, or who have been treated differently because of their sex, race, or disability.
- politically incorrect — not politically correct; potentially offensive to a particular group of people: politically incorrect jokes.
- polygenic inheritance — the heredity of complex characters that are determined by a large number of genes, each one usually having a relatively small effect.
- pomp and circumstance — ceremony
- portable common loops — (PCL) A language which started out as an implementation of CommonLoops and turned into a portable CLOS implementation. Version 1992-08-28. It runs under Lucid Common LISP 4.0.1 and CMU Common LISP 16e.
- potassium bicarbonate — a white, crystalline, slightly alkaline, salty-tasting, water-soluble powder, KHCO 3 , produced by the passage of carbon dioxide through an aqueous potassium carbonate solution: used in cookery as a leavening agent and in medicine as an antacid.
- poweropen association — An independent body established to promote, and test conformance with, the PowerOpen Environment (POE).