20-letter words containing a, e, o
- conformal projection — a map projection in which angles formed by lines are preserved: a map made using this projection preserves the shape of any small area.
- congressional record — (in the US) the government journal that publishes all proceedings of Congress
- congressman-at-large — (in the US) a member of the House of Representatives who was elected by the voters of an entire state as opposed to the voters of a single Congressional district
- connector conspiracy — (business, standard) The tendency of manufacturers (or, by extension, other designers) to come up with products that don't fit with the old stuff, thereby making you buy either all new stuff or expensive interface devices. The term probably came into prominence with the appearance of the DEC KL-10, none of whose connectors matched anything else. The KL-10 Massbus connector was actually *patented* by DEC, who reputedly refused to licence the design, thus effectively locking out competition for the lucrative Massbus peripherals market. This policy was a source of frustration for the owners of dying, obsolescent disk and tape drives. A related phenomenon is the invention of new screw heads so that only Designated Persons, possessing the magic screwdrivers, can remove covers and make repairs or install options. Older Apple Macintoshes took this one step further, requiring not only a hex wrench but a specialised case-cracking tool to open the box. With the advent of more open-systems computing this term has fallen somewhat into disuse. Compare backward combatability.
- conservation of mass — the principle that the total mass of any isolated system is constant and is independent of any chemical and physical changes taking place within the system
- conservative baptist — a member of a Protestant denomination (Conservative Baptist Association of America) organized in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1948.
- conservative judaism — a movement reacting against the radicalism of Reform Judaism, rejecting extreme change and advocating moderate relaxations of traditional Jewish law, by an extension of the process by which its adherents claim traditional Orthodox Judaism evolved
- constant de rebecque — Henri Benjamin [ahn-ree ban-zha-man] /ɑ̃ˈri bɛ̃ ʒaˈmɛ̃/ (Show IPA), (Benjamin Constant) 1767–1830, French statesman and author, born in Switzerland.
- constituent assembly — A constituent assembly is a body of representatives that is elected to create or change their country's constitution.
- contact metamorphism — localized metamorphism resulting from the heat of an igneous intrusion.
- context of situation — the totality of extralinguistic features having relevance to a communicative act.
- context-free grammar — (grammar) (CFG) A grammar where the syntax of each constituent (syntactic category or terminal symbol) is independent of the symbols occuring before and after it in a sentence. A context-free grammar describes a context-free language. Context-free grammars can be expressed by a set of "production rules" or syntactic rules. For example, a language with symbols "a" and "b" that must occur in unequal numbers can be represented by the CFG: S → U | V U → TaU | TaT | UaT V → TbV | TbT | VbT T → aTbT | bTaT | ε meaning the top-level category "S" consists of either a "U" or a "V" and so on. The special category "ε" represents the empty string. This grammar is context-free because each rule has a single symbol on its left-hand side.
- continental congress — the assembly of delegates from the North American rebel colonies held during and after the War of American Independence. It issued the Declaration of Independence (1776) and framed the Articles of Confederation (1777)
- contingency planning — planning for future events that seem less likely than others
- contingent liability — a possible liability that is dependent on the outcome of a future event
- continuing education — Continuing education is education for adults in a variety of subjects, most of which are practical, not academic.
- continuing-education — adult education.
- continuity announcer — A continuity announcer is someone who introduces the next programme on a radio or television station.
- controlled substance — a drug regulated by the Federal Controlled Substances Acts, including opiates, depressants, stimulants, and hallucinogens
- convective discharge — the repulsion of ions of a gas by a highly charged body, creating a discernible wind.
- conventional weapons — weapons which are not nuclear
- conversation stopper — a comment that is so shocking or boring that people stop talking
- coordination complex — one of a number of complex compounds in which an atom or group of atoms is bound to the central atom by a shared pair of electrons supplied by the coordinated group and not by the central atom
- copulative asyndeton — a staccato effect produced by omitting copulative connectives between two or more items in a group, as in “Friends, Romans, countrymen.”.
- corporate governance — the balance of control between the stakeholders, managers, and directors of an organization
- correctional officer — a prison guard
- corresponding angles — a pair of nonadjacent angles, one interior and one exterior, on the same side of a transversal: these paired angles are equal if the lines cut by the transversal are parallel
- corrugated cardboard — cardboard usually made of three different layers, the two outer layers having a smooth surface while the central inner layer is corrugated
- council-manager plan — (in the US) a system of local government with an elected legislative council and an appointed administrative manager
- counter-inflationary — designed to reduce inflation
- counterdemonstration — a demonstration that is held in reaction to another demonstration
- counterproliferation — Action intended to prevent an increase or spread in the possession of nuclear weapons.
- counterrevolutionary — Counterrevolutionary activities are activities intended to reverse the effects of a previous revolution.
- court of last resort — (in the US) a supreme court
- court of st. james's — the British royal court: so called from St. James's Palace, London, the former scene of royal receptions.
- covenant of warranty — warranty (def 2b).
- covenant-of-warranty — warranty (def 2b).
- craniosacral therapy — a form of therapy for various disorders in which the therapist manipulates the bones of the skull
- cream of tomato soup — a creamy soup made from tomatoes
- creative imagination — the faculty of imagining, or of forming mental images or concepts of what is not actually present to the senses.
- criminal proceedings — action taken in a court to bring a criminal prosecution against someone
- cross someone's palm — to give someone money
- cross someone's path — to meet or thwart someone
- crude oil evaluation — Crude oil evaluation is the process of assessing the chemical and physical properties of crude oil, against particular standards.
- cut one's own throat — to be the means of one's own ruin
- cut the gordian knot — to find a quick, bold solution for a perplexing problem
- cytosine arabinoside — cytarabine.
- darkfield microscope — kind of microscope
- data dictionary file — (database) (DDF) A set of files describing the structure of a database file. DDFs define database tables and include information about file locations, field layouts and indexes. DDFs are the standard method for defining field and index characteristics for Btrieve files.
- database transaction — (database) A set of related changes applied to a database. The term typically implies that either all of the changes should be applied or, in the event of an error, none of them, i.e. the transaction should be atomic. Atomicity is one of the ACID properties a transaction can have, another is isolation - preventing interference between processes trying to access the database cocurrently. This is usually achieved by some form of locking - where one process takes exclusive control of a database table or row for the duration of the transaction, preventing other processes from accessing the locked data. The canonical example of a transaction is transferring money between two bank accounts by subtracting it from one and adding it to the other. Some relational database management systems require the user to explicitly start a transaction and then either commit it (if all the individual steps are successful) or roll it back (if there are any errors).