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19-letter words containing a, e, r, i

  • binomial experiment — an experiment consisting of a fixed number of independent trials each with two possible outcomes, success and failure, and the same probability of success. The probability of a given number of successes is described by a binominal distribution
  • bit-paired keyboard — (hardware)   (Obsolete, or "bit-shift keyboard") A non-standard keyboard layout that seems to have originated with the Teletype ASR-33 and remained common for several years on early computer equipment. The ASR-33 was a mechanical device (see EOU), so the only way to generate the character codes from keystrokes was by some physical linkage. The design of the ASR-33 assigned each character key a basic pattern that could be modified by flipping bits if the SHIFT or the CTRL key was pressed. In order to avoid making the thing more of a Rube Goldberg kluge than it already was, the design had to group characters that shared the same basic bit pattern on one key. Looking at the ASCII chart, we find: high low bits bits 0000 0001 0010 0011 0100 0101 0110 0111 1000 1001 010 ! " # $ % & ' ( ) 011 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 This is why the characters !"#$%&'() appear where they do on a Teletype (thankfully, they didn't use shift-0 for space). This was *not* the weirdest variant of the QWERTY layout widely seen, by the way; that prize should probably go to one of several (differing) arrangements on IBM's even clunkier 026 and 029 card punches. When electronic terminals became popular, in the early 1970s, there was no agreement in the industry over how the keyboards should be laid out. Some vendors opted to emulate the Teletype keyboard, while others used the flexibility of electronic circuitry to make their product look like an office typewriter. These alternatives became known as "bit-paired" and "typewriter-paired" keyboards. To a hacker, the bit-paired keyboard seemed far more logical - and because most hackers in those days had never learned to touch-type, there was little pressure from the pioneering users to adapt keyboards to the typewriter standard. The doom of the bit-paired keyboard was the large-scale introduction of the computer terminal into the normal office environment, where out-and-out technophobes were expected to use the equipment. The "typewriter-paired" standard became universal, "bit-paired" hardware was quickly junked or relegated to dusty corners, and both terms passed into disuse.
  • black warrior river — a river in N central Alabama, flowing SW past Birmingham to the Tombigbee River. 178 miles (286 km) long.
  • blackbelly rosefish — a reddish scorpionfish, Helicolenus dactylopterus, inhabiting the deep waters of the western Atlantic Ocean.
  • blood-brain barrier — the barrier created by the walls of the capillaries of the brain that prevents certain substances, as most proteins and drugs, from passing from the blood into the brain tissue and cerebrospinal fluid
  • blue-breasted quail — a small, brightly colored quail, Coturnix chinensis, of southern Asia and Australia, widely kept as a cage bird.
  • blue-tongued lizard — a large Australian lizard, Tiliqua scincoides, characterized by having a cobalt-blue tongue.
  • board certification — the process of certifying that a physician has passed an examination and met the standards of a professional organization representing a particular medical specialty.
  • board of trade unit — a unit of electrical energy equal to 1 kilowatt-hour
  • boat-tailed grackle — a large grackle, Quiscalus major, of the southeastern U.S., that folds its tail into a shape resembling the keel of a boat.
  • booker t washington — Booker T(aliaferro) [boo k-er tol-uh-ver] /ˈbʊk ər ˈtɒl ə vər/ (Show IPA), 1856–1915, U.S. reformer, educator, author, and lecturer.
  • bracket abstraction — (compiler)   An algorithm which turns a term into a function of some variable. The result of using bracket abstraction on T with respect to variable v, written as [v]T, is a term containing no occurrences of v and denoting a function f such that f v = T. This defines the function f = (\ v . T). Using bracket abstraction and currying we can define a language without bound variables in which the only operation is monadic function application. See combinator.
  • breath of fresh air — sth new
  • breathing apparatus — an apparatus, usually consisting of tanks of air or oxygen and a mouthpiece, that enables the wearer to breath in difficult conditions such as a smoke-filled building
  • british east africa — the former British possessions of Uganda, Kenya, Tanganyika, and Zanzibar, before their independence in the 1960s
  • british west africa — the former British possessions of Nigeria, The Gambia, Sierra Leone, and the Gold Coast, and the former trust territories of Togoland and Cameroons
  • brush-tailed possum — any of several widely-distributed Australian possums of the genus Trichosurus
  • bug tracking system — (programming)   (BTS) A system for receiving and filing bugs reported against a software project, and tracking those bugs until they are fixed. Most major software projects have their own BTS, the source code of which is often available for use by other projects. Well known BTSs include GNATS, Bugzilla, and Debbugs.
  • buildings insurance — insurance which covers buildings
  • cable-stayed bridge — a type of suspension bridge in which the supporting cables are connected directly to the bridge deck without the use of suspenders
  • calcium oxychloride — a white powder that decomposes on contact with water and has the characteristic odor of gaseous chlorine: regarded, when dry, as a mixed calcium hypochlorite-chloride, used as a commercial bleach for wood pulp, textiles, oils, and soaps, and in laundering as a decolorizer and disinfectant.
  • calculate a premium — If you calculate a premium, you decide how much a policyholder has to pay for insurance cover.
  • california bluebell — either of two plants, Phacelia campanularia or P. minor, of southern California, having ovate leaves and bell-shaped blue or purple flowers.
  • california job case — a job case having sufficient spaces to contain both uppercase and lowercase letters and 37 additional characters of foundry type. Compare case2 (def 8).
  • california live oak — an evergreen oak, Quercus agrifolia, of the western coast of the U.S., having leathery leaves and a short, stout trunk.
  • california sea lion — any of several large eared seals, as Eumetopias jubatus (Steller's sea lion) of the northern Pacific, and Zalophus californicus (California sea lion) of the Pacific coast of North America.
  • campernelle jonquil — a narcissus, Narcissus odorus, of the amaryllis family, having clusters of two to four fragrant yellow flowers.
  • canterbury pilgrims — the pilgrims whose stories are told in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales
  • cape york peninsula — large peninsula in NE Australia, part of Queensland, between the Gulf of Carpentaria & the Coral Sea
  • capital expenditure — expenditure on acquisitions of or improvements to fixed assets
  • captains courageous — a novel (1897) by Rudyard Kipling.
  • carbon dioxide snow — solid carbon dioxide, used as a refrigerant
  • carbon steel piping — Carbon steel piping is pipes made of steel with carbon as the main alloying component, used for transporting fluids.
  • carnot refrigerator — a device operating on the Carnot cycle in which the first temperature is higher than the second.
  • caroline of ansbach — 1683–1737, wife of George II of Great Britain
  • cat scratch disease — a disorder characterized by fever and swelling of the lymph glands, caused by a viral infection resulting from the scratch or bite of a cat.
  • cat-scratch disease — an ailment characterized by fever and swollen glands and believed to be caused by bacteria transmitted by the scratch or bite of a cat
  • catalytic converter — A catalytic converter is a device which is fitted to a car's exhaust to reduce the pollution coming from it.
  • catalytic reforming — Catalytic reforming is a process that converts petroleum refinery naphthas to high-octane blending components.
  • caterpillar tractor — a tractor powered by a Caterpillar track
  • catherine of aragon — 1485–1536, first wife of Henry VIII of England and mother of Mary I. The annulment of Henry's marriage to her (1533) against papal authority marked an initial stage in the English Reformation
  • catherine the great — (Sophia Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst"Catherine the Great") 1729–96, empress of Russia 1762–96.
  • cathodic protection — a technique for protecting metal structures, such as steel ships and pipelines, from electrolytic corrosion by making the structure the cathode in a cell, either by applying an electromotive force directly or by putting it into contact with a more electropositive metal
  • celestial hierarchy — hierarchy (def 6).
  • central reservation — The central reservation is the strip of ground, often covered with grass, that separates the two sides of a major road.
  • centrifugal casting — casting that utilizes centrifugal force within a spinning mold to force the metal against the walls.
  • ceramic engineering — the branch of engineering concerned with the development and production of ceramics.
  • cerebral hemisphere — either half of the cerebrum
  • cerebral thrombosis — formation of a clot or other blockage in one of the blood vessels of the brain, often followed by neurologic damage; a type of stroke.
  • cerebrospinal fluid — the clear colourless fluid in the spaces inside and around the spinal cord and brain
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