16-letter words containing a, f, t, c
- mexican standoff — a stalemate or impasse; a confrontation that neither side can win.
- microsoft access — 1. (database) A relational database running under Microsoft Windows. Data is stored as a number of "tables", e.g. "Stock". Each table consists of a number of "records" (e.g. for different items) and each record contains a number of "fields", e.g. "Product code", "Supplier", "Quantity in stock". Access allows the user to create "forms" and "reports". A form shows one record in a user-designed format and allows the user to step through records one at a time. A report shows selected records in a user-designed format, possibly grouped into sections with different kinds of total (including sum, minimum, maximum, average). There are also facilities to use links ("joins") between tables which share a common field and to filter records according to certain criteria or search for particular field values. Version: 2 (date?). 2. (communications) A communications program from Microsoft, meant to compete with ProComm and other programs. It sucked and was dropped. Years later they reused the name for their database.
- miraculous fruit — miracle fruit.
- misconfiguration — An incorrect or inappropriate configuration.
- misspecification — An incorrect specification.
- money of account — a monetary denomination used in reckoning, especially one not issued as a coin, as the U.S. mill.
- mossbauer effect — the phenomenon in which an atom in a crystal undergoes no recoil when emitting a gamma ray, giving all the emitted energy to the gamma ray, resulting in a sharply defined wavelength.
- multiple factors — polygene.
- narcotraffickers — Plural form of narcotrafficker.
- narcotrafficking — the buying and selling of illegal drugs.
- neo-confucianist — of or relating to neo-Confucians or neo-Confucianism.
- no-fault divorce — a divorce granted without anyone being found guilty of marital misconduct
- non-confidential — spoken, written, acted on, etc., in strict privacy or secrecy; secret: a confidential remark.
- non-confirmation — the act of confirming.
- non-confirmatory — serving to confirm; corroborative.
- non-manufactured — the making of goods or wares by manual labor or by machinery, especially on a large scale: the manufacture of television sets.
- non-satisfaction — an act of satisfying; fulfillment; gratification.
- nonfinite clause — a clause with a nonfinite verb or with no verb, as the hour being late in The hour being late, we left.
- nonmanufacturing — (economics) Outside of the manufacturing sector.
- nuclear transfer — the procedure used to produce the first cloned mammals, in which the nucleus of a somatic cell is transferred into an egg cell whose own nucleus has been removed. This cell is then stimulated by an electric shock to divide and form an embryo
- oak leaf cluster — a U.S. military decoration in the form of a small bronze twig bearing four oak leaves and three acorns, worn on the ribbon of another decoration for valor, wounds, or distinguished service to signify a second award of the same medal.
- of a certain age — of an unspecified age, but no longer young
- of it own accord — If something happens of its own accord, it seems to happen by itself, without anyone making it happen.
- on the back foot — at a disadvantage; outmanoeuvred or outclassed by an opponent
- one's cup of tea — the dried and prepared leaves of a shrub, Camellia sinensis, from which a somewhat bitter, aromatic beverage is prepared by infusion in hot water.
- one-way function — (cryptography, mathematics) A function which is easy to compute but whose inverse is very difficult to compute. Such functions have important applications in cryptography, specifically in public-key cryptography. See also: trapdoor function.
- ordnance factory — a factory that makes military weapons and ammunition
- orthoformic acid — a hypothetical acid, HC(OH) 3 , known only in the form of its esters.
- out of character — the aggregate of features and traits that form the individual nature of some person or thing.
- pacific sturgeon — a dark gray sturgeon, Acipenser transmontanus, inhabiting marine and fresh waters along the northwestern coast of North America, valued as a food and sport fish.
- packing fraction — Physics. a measure of the stability of an atomic nucleus, equal to 10 4 multiplied by the mass defect and divided by the mass number.
- partial fraction — one of the fractions into which a given fraction can be resolved, the sum of such simpler fractions being equal to the given fraction: Partial fractions of 5/(x2−x) are 5/(x−1) and −5/x.
- partial function — A function which is not defined for all arguments of its input type. E.g. f(x) = 1/x if x /= 0. The opposite of a total function. In denotational semantics, a partial function f : D -> C may be represented as a total function ft : D' -> lift(C) where D' is a superset of D and ft x = f x if x in D ft x = bottom otherwise where lift(C) = C U bottom. Bottom (LaTeX \perp) denotes "undefined".
- pathetic fallacy — the endowment of nature, inanimate objects, etc., with human traits and feelings, as in the smiling skies; the angry sea.
- perforated ulcer — an ulcer that bursts through the stomach wall and leaks food and gastric juices into the abdominal cavity
- performance test — a test requiring little or no use of language, the test materials being designed to elicit manual or behavioral responses rather than verbal ones.
- personal effects — belongings
- physical fitness — good physical condition
- placement office — an office in a university that offers students careers advice and help to find employment
- platform-balance — a scale with a platform for holding the items to be weighed.
- point of contact — (networking) (POC) An individual associated with a particular Internet entity (IP network, domain, ASN).
- powerpc platform — (architecture, standard) (PPCP, PReP - PowerPC Reference Platform, formerly CHRP - Common Hardware Reference Platform) An open system standard, designed by IBM, intended to ensure compatibility among PowerPC-based systems built by different companies. The PReP standard specifies the PCI bus, but will also support ISA, MicroChannel and PCMCIA. PReP-compliant systems will be able to run the Macintosh OS, OS/2, WorkplaceOS, AIX, Solaris, Taligent and Windows NT. IBM systems will (of course) be PReP-compliant. Apple's first PowerPC Macintoshes will not be compliant, but future ones may be.
- practical effect — Usually, practical effects. a special effect that is created live on the set of a film, using real-world objects.
- prespecification — the act of specifying.
- prince's feather — a tall, showy plant, Amaranthus hybridus erythrostachys, of the amaranth family, having reddish foliage and thick spikes of small, red flowers.
- prince's-feather — a tall, showy plant, Amaranthus hybridus erythrostachys, of the amaranth family, having reddish foliage and thick spikes of small, red flowers.
- principal rafter — a diagonal member of a roof principal, usually forming part of a truss and supporting the purlins on which the common rafters rest.
- quantum sufficit — as much as suffices; enough.
- quasi-scientific — of or relating to science or the sciences: scientific studies.
- question of fact — a question concerning the reality of an alleged event or circumstance in a trial by jury, usually determined by the jury.