27-letter words containing a, g, r, o, t, e

magnetostrictive delay line — (storage, history) An early storage device that used tensioned wires of nickel alloy carrying longitudinal waves produced and detected electromagnetically. They had better storage behaviour than mercury delay lines.
management information base — (networking) (MIB) A database of managed objects acessed by network management protocols. An SNMP MIB is a set of parameters which an SNMP management station can query or set in the SNMP agent of a network device (e.g. router). Standard minimal MIBs have been defined, and many hardware (and certain software, e.g. DBMS) providers have developed private MIBs in ASN.1 format allowing them to be compiled for use in a Network Management System. In theory, any SNMP manager can talk to any SNMP agent with a properly defined MIB. See also client-server model.
memorandum of understanding — a document that describes the general principles of an agreement between parties, but does not amount to a substantive contract
memory type range registers — (architecture, video) (MTRR) Registers in the Pentium Pro and Pentium II processors that can be used to specify a strategy for communication with the external memory and caches for a number of physical address ranges. Strategies include write-through, write-back, or uncached(?). Such control is useful where the memory is located on a device and is accessed via some kind of device bus, e.g. a PCI or AGP graphics card, where caching would be of no benefit.
metallic wood-boring beetle — any of numerous metallic green, blue, copper, or black beetles of the family Buprestidae, the larvae of which bore into the wood of trees.
natural language processing — (artificial intelligence) (NLP) Computer understanding, analysis, manipulation, and/or generation of natural language. This can refer to anything from fairly simple string-manipulation tasks like stemming, or building concordances of natural language texts, to higher-level AI-like tasks like processing user queries in natural language.
network definition language — (NDL) The language used to program the DCP (Data Communications Processor) on Burroughs Large System. Version: NDL II.
neurolinguistic programming — a therapy designed to alter behaviour by reprogramming unconscious patterns of thought
newton's law of gravitation — the principle that two particles attract each other with forces directly proportional to the product of their masses divided by the square of the distance between them
nothing to write home about — If you say that something is nothing to write home about, you mean that it is not very interesting or exciting.
object relational modelling — object relational mapping
object-oriented programming — (programming) (OOP) The use of a class of programming languages and techniques based on the concept of an "object" which is a data structure (abstract data type) encapsulated with a set of routines, called "methods", which operate on the data. Operations on the data can only be performed via these methods, which are common to all objects that are instances of a particular "class". Thus the interface to objects is well defined, and allows the code implementing the methods to be changed so long as the interface remains the same. Each class is a separate module and has a position in a "class hierarchy". Methods or code in one class can be passed down the hierarchy to a subclass or inherited from a superclass. This is called "inheritance". A procedure call is described as invoking a method on an object (which effectively becomes the procedure's first argument), and may optionally include other arguments. The method name is looked up in the object's class to find out how to perform that operation on the given object. If the method is not defined for the object's class, it is looked for in its superclass and so on up the class hierarchy until it is found or there is no higher superclass. OOP started with SIMULA-67 around 1970 and became all-pervasive with the advent of C++, and later Java. Another popular object-oriented programming language (OOPL) is Smalltalk, a seminal example from Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC). Others include Ada, Object Pascal, Objective C, DRAGOON, BETA, Emerald, POOL, Eiffel, Self, Oblog, ESP, LOOPS, POLKA, and Python. Other languages, such as Perl and VB, permit, but do not enforce OOP.
on the understanding (that) — If you agree to do something on the understanding that something else will be done, you do it because you have been told that the other thing will definitely be done.
open scripting architecture — (OSA) A CIL approach to the coexistence of multiple scripting systems.
orderly marketing agreement — any of various formal arrangements by which the volume of certain imported commodities, as steel or textiles, is voluntarily reduced. Abbreviation: OMA.
oscillating universe theory — the theory that the universe is oscillating between periods of expansion and collapse
outline planning permission — a permission for building on land which sets out general but not yet detailed guidelines
perfect programmer syndrome — Arrogance; the egotistical conviction that one is above normal human error. Most frequently found among programmers of some native ability but relatively little experience (especially new graduates; their perceptions may be distorted by a history of excellent performance at solving toy problems). "Of course my program is correct, there is no need to test it." "Yes, I can see there may be a problem here, but *I'll* never type "rm -r /" while in root mode."
peripheral technology group — (company) A national and international distributor of IBM PC-to-Unix and Internet connectivity products. They cater for resellers, dealers and VARs and are one of the top Seagate and Micropolis distributors in the US. Address: Eden Prairie, MN, USA (a suburb of Minneapolis). Eden Prairie ("Silicon Prairie") is the home of Digi International, Ontrack, Open Systems, LaserMaster, Best Buy, and others.
post-viral fatigue syndrome — Post-viral fatigue syndrome is a long-lasting illness that is thought to be caused by a virus. Its symptoms include feeling tired all the time and muscle pain.
potassium hydrogen tartrate — a colourless or white soluble crystalline salt used in baking powders, soldering fluxes, and laxatives. Formula: KHC4H4O6
public broadcasting service — a network of independent, noncommercial television stations that operate with public and government funding instead of with revenues from advertising. Abbreviation: PBS.
public service broadcasting — publicly-funded broadcasting
rough endoplasmic reticulum — a network of tubular membranes within the cytoplasm of the cell, occurring either with a smooth surface (smooth endoplasmic reticulum) or studded with ribosomes (rough endoplasmic reticulum) involved in the transport of materials.
senile macular degeneration — a type of macular degeneration that is one of the leading causes of blindness in the elderly and in which tiny blood vessels grow into the macula of the retina, obscuring vision. Abbreviation: SMD.
serial storage architecture — (storage) (SSA) IBM's proposed ANSI standard for a standard high-speed interface to disk clusters and arrays. SSA allows full-duplex packet multiplexed serial data transfers at rates of 20Mb/sec in each direction. According to John Taylor, programme manager at IBM's Storage Division at Havant, SSA will be used in arrays of discs working with high-end computers ranging from mainframes down to LAN servers. Taylor said that SSA differs from the IEEE proposed P1394 serial interface specification in its ability to offer simultaneous multiplexed transfers from more than one disk or array. IBM also supports the P1394 standard which will be used primarily by desktop PCs for multimedia applications. SSA has received backing from a number of companies including connector makers Molex, ITT Cannon and AMP, disk drive makers Conner and Western Digital and RAID array suppliers like Dynatech and NCR. IBM expects to see the first SSA products released at Comdex in Autumn 1994 but it will be 1995 before the products ship in volume. Under an agreement signed with ASIC maker and ARM licencee VLSI Technology, IBM will use ARM-based chips made by VLSI to implement the SSA interface and VLSI will make these cores available to third parties as one of its Functional System Blocks.
single connector attachment — Single Connection Attach
stock market closing report — a summary of the prices of stocks and shares at the end of trading including information about their gains or losses over the trading period
storage management services — (storage) (SMS) Software that enables network administrators to route backup data from various devices on a network to another device such as a server or a magnetic tape backup unit. This is done either to make use of a high-capacity storage system such as a tape juke-box or for disaster protection.
take someone's fingerprints — If the police take someone's fingerprints, they make that person press their fingers onto a pad covered with ink, and then onto paper, so that they know what that person's fingerprints look like.
teach an old dog new tricks — to induce a person of settled habits to adopt new methods or ideas
telephone answering machine — answering machine.
the long and (the) short of — the whole story of in a few words; gist or point of
throw one's hat in the ring — a shaped covering for the head, usually with a crown and brim, especially for wear outdoors.
thyroid stimulating hormone — thyrotropin. Abbreviation: TSH.
thyroid-stimulating hormone — thyrotropin. Abbreviation: TSH.
to be bursting at the seams — to be very full
to breathe a sigh of relief — If people breathe or heave a sigh of relief, they feel happy that something unpleasant has not happened or is no longer happening.
to fight a rearguard action — if someone is fighting a rearguard action or mounting a rearguard action, they are trying very hard to prevent something from happening, even though it is probably too late for them to succeed
to give someone a free hand — If someone gives you a free hand, they give you the freedom to use your own judgment and to do exactly as you wish.
to know something backwards — In British English, if you say that someone knows something backwards, you are emphasizing that they know it very well. In American English, you say that someone knows something backward and forward.
to rear/raise its ugly head — If you say that something unpleasant or embarrassing rears its ugly head or raises its ugly head, you mean that it occurs, often after not occurring for some time.
to rule sb with a high hand — to behave imperiously towards someone
to run rings around someone — If you say that someone runs rings round you or runs rings around you, you mean that they are a lot better or a lot more successful than you at a particular activity.
to throw money at something — If you say that someone is throwing money at a problem, you are critical of them for trying to improve it by spending money on it, instead of doing more thoughtful and practical things to improve it.
tonguing-and-grooving plane — a plane for cutting the edges of boards into tongues and grooves.
united nations organization — the United Nations. Abbreviation: UNO, U.N.O.
united service organization — a private, non-profit organization that provides morale and recreational services to members of the US military, with programmes in 140 centres worldwide
universal naming convention — (networking) (UNC) The type of file system path used in Microsoft Windows networking to completely specify a directory on a file server. The basic format is: \\servername\sharename where "servername" is the hostname or IP address of a network file server, and "sharename" is the name of a shared directory on the server. This is related to the conventional MS-DOS "C:\windows" style of directory name. E.g. \\server1\dave might be set up to point to C:\users\homedirs\dave on a server called "server1". It is possible to execute a program using this convention without having to specifically link a drive, by running: \\server\share\directory\program.exe The undocumented DOS command, TRUENAME can be used to find out the UNC name of a file or directory on a network drive. Even Microsoft don't know whether UNC stands for "Universal Naming Convention" or "Uniform Naming Convention", both appear on their website, sometimes withing the same document, but with a preference for "Universal".
university grants committee — an advisory committee of the British government, which advised on the distribution of grant funding amongst British universities. It was in existence from 1919 until 1989. Its functions have now largely been taken over by the higher education funding councils (HEFCE (England), SHEFC (Scotland), HEFCW (Wales), and the Department for Employment and Learning in Northern Ireland)

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