18-letter words containing a, c, r
- all over the place — If something is happening all over the place, it is happening in many different places.
- almoner's cupboard — a cupboard with pierced doors, formerly used as a storage place for food.
- alpha-hydroxy acid — a type of organic acid, commonly used in skin-care preparations, that has a hydroxyl group attached to the carbon atom next to the carbon atom carrying the carboxyl group
- alphaphotographics — A display made up of text characters combined with high-resolution photographic images (proposed as a future form of videotex).
- alternative comedy — a style of comedy originating in the UK in the 1980s that seeks to avoid racist or sexist stereotypes, and usually puts forward left-wing, anti-establishment views
- alternative school — any public or private school having a special curriculum, especially an elementary or secondary school offering a more flexible program of study than a traditional school.
- amdahl corporation — (company) A US computer manufacturer. Amdahl is a major supplier of large mainframes, UNIX and Open Systems software and servers, data storage subsystems, data communications products, applications development software, and a variety of educational and consulting services. Amdahl products are sold in more than 30 countries for use in both open systems and IBM plug-compatible mainframe computing environments. Quarterly sales $397M, profits $13M (Aug 1994). In 1997 Amdahl became a division of Fujitsu.
- american brooklime — any of various speedwells found along brooks, in marshes, etc., as Veronica americana (American brooklime) a creeping plant having leafy stems and loose clusters of small blue flowers.
- american chameleon — anole: lizards of this type (family Iguanidae) are incorrectly called “chameleons”
- american civil war — the war in the U.S. between the North and the South, 1861–65.
- american cockroach — a large, reddish-brown cockroach, Periplaneta americana, found originally in the southern U.S. but now widely distributed.
- american cranberry — See under cranberry (def 1).
- ammonium carbamate — a white soluble crystalline compound produced by reaction between dry ammonia and carbon dioxide and used as a nitrogen fertilizer. Formula: (NH4)CO2NH2
- ammonium carbonate — an unstable pungent soluble white powder that is a double salt of ammonium bicarbonate and ammonium carbamate: used in the manufacture of baking powder, smelling salts, and ammonium compounds. Formula: (NH4)HCO3.(NH4)CO2NH2
- an overgrown child — an adult whose behaviour is characteristic of a child
- analogue recording — a sound recording process in which an audio input is converted into an analogous electrical waveform
- analytical reagent — a chemical compound of a known high standard of purity
- angiocardiographic — Relating to angiocardiography.
- anthropocentricity — the state or quality of being anthropocentric.
- anti-aircraft fire — the discharging of weapons, artillery, etc aimed at destroying enemy aircraft
- anti-commercialism — the principles, practices, and spirit of commerce.
- anti-masonic party — a former political party (1826–35) that opposed Freemasonry in civil affairs.
- anticholinesterase — any of a group of substances that inhibit the action of cholinesterase
- anticipated profit — the profit that one expects to make from a deal, transaction, or project
- antidiscrimination — (legal) Opposing or disallowing discrimination.
- antifriction alloy — a metallic alloy, as Babbitt metal or bearing bronze, having antifriction qualities.
- antiscorbutic acid — vitamin C
- aorangi-mount cook — the official name for Mount Cook
- apocryphal gospels — accounts of Christ's life that are not recognized as part of the New Testament
- appalachian spring — a dance (1944) choreographed by Martha Graham, with musical score by Aaron Copland.
- apparatus criticus — textual notes, list of variant readings, etc, relating to a document, esp in a scholarly edition of a text
- application server — 1.
A designer's or developer's suite of software that helps programmers isolate the business logic in their programs from the platform-related code. Application servers can handle all of the application logic and connectivity found in client-server applications. Many application servers also offer features such as transaction management, clustering and failover, and load balancing; nearly all offer ODBC support. 2. Production programs run on a mid-sized computer that handle all application operations between browser-based computers and an organisation's back-end business applications or databases. The application server works as a translator, allowing, for example, a customer with a browser to search an online retailer's database for pricing information. 3. The device on which application server software runs. Application Service Providers offer commercial access to such devices. - apprentice plumber — a trainee plumber
- arachibutyrophobia — Fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of one's mouth.
- arbitration clause — a clause in a contract laying down that disputes between the parties should be settled by arbitration
- arctic archipelago — group of mostly large islands in the Arctic Ocean off the N coast of Canada
- aristotelian logic — the logical theories of Aristotle as developed in the Middle Ages, concerned mainly with syllogistic reasoning: traditional as opposed to modern or symbolic logic
- arkansas toothpick — a bowie knife or similar sharp knifelike implement.
- arm's-length price — a price of a transaction agreed in accordance with market values, disregarding any connection such as common ownership of the companies involved
- army of occupation — an army that goes into a defeated country to enforce peace terms, keep order, etc.
- arrogance of power — presumption on the part of a nation that its power gives it the right to intervene in the affairs of less powerful nations.
- arsenic trisulfide — a yellow or red crystalline substance, As 2 S 3 , occurring in nature as the mineral orpiment, and used as a pigment (king's yellow) and in pyrotechnics.
- artificial gravity — a simulated gravity or sensation of weight established within a spacecraft by means of the craft's rotation, acceleration, or deceleration.
- artificial horizon — an aircraft instrument, using a gyroscope, that indicates the aircraft's attitude in relation to the horizontal
- artificial reality — virtual reality.
- as clear as a bell — If something is as clear as a bell, it is very clear indeed.
- asciibetical order — (jargon, programming) /as'kee-be'-t*-kl or'dr/ Used to indicate that data is sorted in ASCII collated order rather than alphabetical order. The main difference is that, in ASCII, all the upper case letters come before any of the lower case letters so, e.g., "Z" comes before "a".
- asiatic black bear — a bear, Selenarctos thibetanus, of central and E Asia, whose coat is black with a pale V-shaped mark on the chest
- aspherical surface — a lens or mirror surface that does not form part of a sphere and is used to reduce aberrations
- assessment process — a series of steps that constitute a method of assessing students or workers