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22-letter words containing a, d, r, i, t

  • color graphics adapter — (hardware, graphics)   (CGA) One of IBM's earliest hardware video display standards for use in IBM PCs. CGA can display 80*25 or 40*25 text in 16 colors, 640*200 pixels of graphics in two colors or 320*200 in four colors (IBM PC video modes 0-6). It is now obsolete.
  • command line interface — (operating system)   A means of communication between a program and its user, based solely on textual input and output. Commands are input with the help of a keyboard or similar device and are interpreted and executed by the program. Results are output as text or graphics to the terminal. Command line interfaces usually provide greater flexibility than graphical user interfaces, at the cost of being harder for the novice to use. Consequently, some hackers look down on GUIs as designed For The Rest Of Them.
  • communication disorder — any of a number of disorders, as autism or deafness, that partially or totally prevent verbal or written expression or comprehension.
  • compass deviation card — a card, sheet, or the like, with two compass roses printed on it concentrically, for recording, on a given voyage, the amount of deviation for which the navigator must compensate in using the ship's compass to steer a magnetic course.
  • complementary medicine — the treatment, alleviation, or prevention of disease by such techniques as osteopathy, homeopathy, aromatherapy, and acupuncture, allied with attention to such factors as diet and emotional stability, which can affect a person's wellbeing
  • complete quadrilateral — a polygon consisting of four lines and their six points of intersection
  • compulsory liquidation — the liquidation of a business in order to settle its debts
  • concentration gradient — the gradual difference in concentration of a dissolved substance in a solution between a region of high density and one of lower density.
  • congressional district — (in the US) an electoral division of a state, entitled to send one member to the US House of Representatives
  • constructive dismissal — If an employee claims constructive dismissal, they begin a legal action against their employer in which they claim that they were forced to leave their job because of the behaviour of their employer.
  • contextual advertising — a form of targeted advertising used on websites or other media, such as content displayed in mobile browsers
  • continuous welded rail — a long, continuous rail formed by welding many short rails.
  • contradiction in terms — a term, phrase, or phenomenon containing self-contradictory parts
  • coronary heart disease — any heart disorder caused by disease of the coronary arteries
  • crankshaft end bearing — The crankshaft end bearing is the bearing between the connecting rod and the crankshaft of an internal combustion engine.
  • cross the great divide — to die
  • curly-coated retriever — a strongly built variety of retriever with a tightly curled black or liver-coloured coat
  • curriculum coordinator — a member of a teaching staff with a largely administrative function whose job is to ensure that a curriculum is effectively taught
  • cylindrical coordinate — Usually, cylindrical coordinates. a member of a system of coordinates for locating a point in space by its polar coordinates and its perpendicular distance to the polar plane.
  • d'alembert's principle — the principle that for a moving body the external forces are in equilibrium with the inertial forces; a generalization of Newton's third law of motion
  • dalton's atomic theory — the theory that matter consists of indivisible particles called atoms and that atoms of a given element are all identical and can neither be created nor destroyed. Compounds are formed by combination of atoms in simple ratios to give compound atoms (molecules). The theory was the basis of modern chemistry
  • damn with faint praise — If someone damns something with faint praise, they say something about it which sounds quite nice but is not enthusiastic, and shows that they do not have a high opinion of it.
  • dandie dinmont terrier — any of a breed of small terrier with short legs, drooping ears, and a generally rough coat with a mass of silky hair on top of the head
  • dashing white sergeant — a lively Scottish dance for sets of six people
  • database administrator — (job)   A person responsible for the design and management of one or more databases and for the evaluation, selection and implementation of database management systems. In smaller organisations, the data administrator and database administrator are often one in the same; however, when they are different, the database administrator's function is more technical. The database administrator would implement the database software that meets the requirements outlined by the organisation's data administrator and systems analysts. Tasks might include controling an organisation's data resources, using data dictionary software to ensure data integrity and security, recovering corrupted data and eliminating data redundancy and uses tuning tools to improve database performance.
  • database normalisation — (database)   A series of steps followed to obtain a database design that allows for efficient access and storage of data in a relational database. These steps reduce data redundancy and the chances of data becoming inconsistent. A table in a relational database is said to be in normal form if it satisfies certain constraints. Codd's original work defined three such forms but there are now five generally accepted steps of normalisation. The output of the first step is called First Normal Form (1NF), the output of the second step is Second Normal Form (2NF), etc. First Normal Form eliminates repeating groups by putting each value of a multi-valued attribute into a new row. Second Normal Form eliminates functional dependencies on a partial key by putting the fields in a separate table from those that are dependent on the whole key. Third Normal Form eliminates functional dependencies on non-key fields by putting them in a separate table. At this stage, all non-key fields are dependent on the key, the whole key and nothing but the key. Fourth Normal Form separates independent multi-valued facts stored in one table into separate tables. Fifth Normal Form breaks out data redundancy that is not covered by any of the previous normal forms.
  • de broglie wave length — the postulate of wave mechanics that a particle of mass m moving at a velocity v will have the properties of a wave of wavelength h / mv (de Broglie wavelength) where h is Planck's constant.
  • decompartmentalization — the act of decompartmentalizing
  • dehydroepiandrosterone — the most abundant steroid in the human body, that is involved in the manufacture of testosterone, oestrogen, progesterone, and corticosterone
  • delaunay triangulation — (mathematics, graphics)   (After B. Delaunay) For a set S of points in the Euclidean plane, the unique triangulation DT(S) of S such that no point in S is inside the circumcircle of any triangle in DT(S). DT(S) is the dual of the voronoi diagram of S.
  • delayed-action shutter — a camera shutter that opens after an interval set by the photographer
  • descriptive cataloging — the aspect of cataloging concerned with the bibliographic and physical description of a book, recording, or other work, accounting for such items as author or performer, title, edition, and imprint as opposed to subject content.
  • descriptive statistics — the use of statistics to describe a set of known data in a clear and concise manner, as in terms of its mean and variance, or diagrammatically, as by a histogram
  • developmental disorder — any condition, such as autism or dyslexia, that appears in childhood and is characterized by delay in the development of one or more psychological functions, such as language skill
  • diachronic linguistics — historical linguistics.
  • dicyclopentadienyliron — ferrocene (def 1).
  • diethylbarbituric acid — barbital
  • digital control system — (systems)   (DCS) A digital computer used for real-time control of a dynamic system, usually in an industrial environment, possibly as part of a Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system. A DCS samples feedback from the system under control and modifies the control signals in an attempt to achieve some desired behaviour. Analysis of such digital-analogue feedback systems can involve mathematical methods such as difference equations, Laplace transforms, z transfer functions, state space models and state transition matrices.
  • digital radio mondiale — (communications)   (DRM) A form of monaural digital broadcast using carrier frequencies below 30 MHz. DRM uses MPEG-4 AAC Main Profile and SBR at data rates of 16-25 kbps.
  • digital standard mumps — (DSM) DEC's version of MUMPS.
  • digital versatile disc — (storage)   (DVD, formerly "Digital Video Disc") An optical storage medium with improved capacity and bandwidth compared with the Compact Disc. DVD, like CD, was initally marketed for entertainment and later for computer users. [When was it first available?] A DVD can hold a full-length film with up to 133 minutes of high quality video, in MPEG-2 format, and audio. The first DVD drives for computers were read-only drives ("DVD-ROM"). These can store 4.7 GBytes - over seven times the storage capacity of CD-ROM. DVD-ROM drives read existing CD-ROMs and music CDs and are compatible with installed sound and video boards. Additionally, the DVD-ROM drive can read DVD films and modern computers can decode them in software in real-time. The DVD video standard was announced in November 1995. Matshusita did much of the early development but Philips made the first DVD player, which appeared in Japan in November 1996. In May 2004, Sony released the first dual-layer drive, which increased the disc capacity to 8.5 GB. Double-sided, dual-layer discs will eventually increase the capacity to 17 GB. Write-once DVD-R ("recordable") drives record a 3.9GB DVD-R disc that can be read on a DVD-ROM drive. Pioneer released the first DVD-R drive on 1997-09-29. By March 1997, Hitachi had released a rewritable DVD-RAM drive (by false analogy with random-access memory). DVD-RAM drives read and write to a 2.6 GB DVD-RAM disc, read and write-once to a 3.9GB DVD-R disc, and read a 4.7 GB or 8.5 GB DVD-ROM. Later, DVD-RAM discs could be read on DVD-R and DVD-ROM drives.
  • digital video recorder — See DVR.
  • dilation and curettage — a surgical method for the removal of diseased tissue or an early embryo from the lining of the uterus by means of scraping.
  • directed acyclic graph — (DAG) A directed graph containing no cycles. This means that if there is a route from node A to node B then there is no way back.
  • directional derivative — the limit, as a function of several variables moving along a given line from one specified point to another on the line, of the difference in the functional values at the two points divided by the distance between the points.
  • directional microphone — a microphone that has a greater sensitivity to sounds coming from a particular area in front of it: used to eliminate unwanted sounds.
  • director of admissions — a member of a university staff who is in overall charge of admissions to the university and its courses
  • directory system agent — (DSA) The software that provides the X.500 Directory Service for a portion of the directory information base. Generally, each DSA is responsible for the directory information for a single organisation or organisational unit.
  • disciplinary committee — a committee charged with examining alleged breaches of discipline within an organization, profession, etc and adjudicating on them
  • disposable soma theory — the theory that ageing is caused by the body having increasingly fewer resources to allocate towards repairing wear and damage to tissues
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