29-letter words containing a, m, i, n, o, t
- have mixed feelings about sth — If you have mixed feelings about something or someone, you feel uncertain about them because you can see both good and bad points about them.
- in a majority/in the majority — If a group is in a majority or in the majority, they form more than half of a larger group.
- incremental constraint solver — A system in which a constraint solver is given constraints one at a time by an inference engine (as is found in Prolog). The solver adds the new constraint to an initially empty set of solved constraints. If the new constraint is consistent with the solved constraints it will be added to the set. If it was inconsistent, the inference engine backtracks. This is the basis of Constraint Logic Programming.
- individual retirement account — a savings plan that offers tax advantages to an individual depositor to set aside money for retirement. Abbreviation: IRA.
- information management system — (database) (IMS, IMS/VS, IMS/ESA) A database system from IBM consisting of IMS/Data Base and IMS/Data Communications.
- integrated systems laboratory — (company) A joint project of Control Data Corporation and NCR Corporation, established in 1973 and dissolved in 1976. Integrated Systems Laboratory developed Software Writer's Language. Address: Escondidio, California, USA.
- intermedia interchange format — A Standard Hypertext Interchange format from IRIS.
- international system of units — an internationally accepted coherent system of physical units, derived from the MKSA (meter-kilogram-second-ampere) system, using the meter, kilogram, second, ampere, kelvin, mole, and candela as the basic units (SI units) respectively of the fundamental quantities of length, mass, time, electric current, temperature, amount of substance, and luminous intensity. Abbreviation: SI.
- juvenile rheumatoid arthritis — rheumatoid arthritis that begins before puberty, often preceded by such symptoms as fever, patchy rash, and weight loss.
- keep something/someone at bay — If you keep something or someone at bay, or hold them at bay, you prevent them from reaching, attacking, or affecting you.
- law of independent assortment — the principle, originated by Gregor Mendel, stating that when two or more characteristics are inherited, individual hereditary factors assort independently during gamete production, giving different traits an equal opportunity of occurring together.
- like taking candy from a baby — very easy to accomplish
- lotus development corporation — (company) A software company who produced Lotus 1-2-3, the Symphony spreadsheet and Lotus Notes for the IBM PC. Disliked by the League for Programming Freedom on account of their lawsuits. Quarterly sales $224M, profits $10M (Aug 1994). Telephone: +1 (617) 225 1284.
- make a pitch/make one's pitch — If someone makes a pitch for something, they try to persuade people to do or buy it.
- make an exhibition of oneself — to behave so foolishly in public that one excites notice or ridicule
- management information system — a computerized information-processing system designed to support the activities and functions of company management. Abbreviation: MIS.
- mark-sweep garbage collection — Each cell has a bit reserved for marking which is clear initially. During garbage collection all active cells are traced from the root and marked. Then all cells are examined. Unmarked cells are freed.
- maximum likelihood estimation — a method of estimating population characteristics from a sample by choosing the values of the parameters that will maximize the probability of getting the particular sample actually obtained from the population.
- mechanical equivalent of heat — (in any system of physical units) the number of units of work or energy equal to one unit of heat, as 4.1858 joules, which equals one small calorie.
- mecklenburg-western pomerania — a state in NE Germany. 8842 sq. mi. (22,900 sq. km). Capital: Schwerin.
- metadata information partners — The Metadata Company
- methylenedioxymethamphetamine — The psychoactive drug MDMA or Ecstasy, an amphetamine that produces entactogenic, psychedelic, and stimulant effects.
- microelectromechanical system — (hardware) (MEMS) The integration of mechanical structures (moving parts) with microelectronics. MEMS devices are "custom" designed for a purpose which requires a mechanical action to be controlled by a computer. Applications include sensors, medical devices, process controls. See also nanotechnology.
- modified frequency modulation — (storage) (MFM, Modified FM, or sometimes "Multiple Frequency Modulation") A modification to the original frequency modulation scheme for encoding data on magnetic disks. MFM allows more than 1 symbol per flux transition (up to 3), giving greater density of data. It is used with a data rate of between 250-500 kbit/s on industry standard 3.5" and 5.25" low and high density diskettes, and up to 5 Mbit/s on ST-506 hard disks. Except for 1.44 MB floppy disks, this encoding is obsolete. Other data encoding schemes include GCR, FM, RLL. See also: PRML.
- monday-morning quarterbacking — wisdom after the event, esp by spectators
- monobasic potassium phosphate — potassium diphosphate. See under potassium phosphate.
- mordovian autonomous republic — an autonomous republic in the Russian Federation in Europe. 9843 sq. mi. (25,493 sq. km). Capital: Saransk.
- more trouble than it is worth — If you say that someone or something is more trouble than they are worth, you mean that they cause you a lot of problems or take a lot of time and effort and you do not achieve or gain very much in return.
- multics relational data store — (database) (MRDS) The first commercial relational database, implemented as part of Multics by Jim Weeldreyer and Oris Friesen of Honeywell Phoenix in about 1977. MRDS included a report writer called LINUS written by Jim Falksen.
- multiple personality disorder — psychiatric illness: split personality
- multiprotocol label switching — (networking) (MPLS) A packet switching protocol developed by the IETF. Initially developed to improve switching speed, other benefits are now seen as being more important. MPLS adds a 32-bit label to each packet to improve network efficiency and to enable routers to direct packets along predefined routes in accordance with the required quality of service. The label is added when the packet enters the MPLS network, and is based on an analysis of the packet header. The label contains information on the route along which the packet may travel, and the forwarding equivalence class (FEC) of the packet. Packets with the same FEC are routed through the network in the same way. Routers make forwarding decisions based purely on the contents of the label. This simplifies the work done by the router, leading to an increase in speed. At each router, the label is replaced with a new label, which tells the next router how to forward the packet. The label is removed when the packet leaves the MPLS network. Modern ASIC-based routers can look up routes fast enough to make the speed increase less important. However, MPLS still has some benefits. The use of FECs allows QoS levels to be guaranteed, and MPLS allows IP tunnels to be created through a network, so that VPNs can be implemented without encryption.
- ningxia hui autonomous region — an administrative division in N China. 25,640 sq. mi. (66,400 sq. km). Capital: Yinchuan.
- non-governmental organization — activism: independent group
- non-uniform rational b spline — (graphics, mathematics) (nurbs) A common term in Mechanical CAD. The NURBS has excellent continuity characteristics which make it useful for creating accurate models in 3D geometry generation and computer modelling.
- not with a bang but a whimper — If you say that something happens not with a bang but a whimper, you mean that it is less effective or exciting than was expected or intended.
- nuclear regulatory commission — an independent agency, created in 1975, that licenses and regulates the nonmilitary use of nuclear energy. Abbreviation: NRC.
- object compatibility standard — (OCS) An 88open standard for compilers and linkers.
- opportunity management system — (business) (OMS) A system that stores sales opportunities and related information. Each sales lead can be tracked with information such as source, type, worth, status, likelihood of closure etc. An OMS can perform other related tasks such as prioritising sales calls and generating analyses that assist the fine-tuning of marketing strategies. See also Customer Relationship Management.
- presidential medal of freedom — a medal awarded by the president of the U.S. to any citizen who has made an exceptionally meritorious contribution to the security or national interest of the U.S., to world peace, or to cultural or other significant endeavors.
- programmable logic controller — (hardware) (PLC) A device used to automate monitoring and control of industrial plant. Can be used stand-alone or in conjunction with a SCADA or other system.
- put someone through his paces — to test the ability of someone
- put the cat among the pigeons — to introduce some violently disturbing new element
- rapid application development — (programming) (RAD) A loose term for any software life-cycle designed to give faster development and better results and to take maximum advantage of recent advances in development software. RAD is associated with a wide range of approaches to software development: from hacking away in a GUI builder with little in the way of analysis and design to complete methodologies expanding on an information engineering framework. Some of the current RAD techniques are: CASE tools, iterative life-cycles, prototyping, workshops, SWAT teams, timebox development, and Re-use of applications, templates and code.
- recommended dietary allowance — the amount of an essential nutrient, as a vitamin or mineral, that has been established by the Food and Nutrition Board of the National Academy of Sciences as adequate to meet the average daily nutritional needs of most healthy persons according to age group and sex. Abbreviation: RDA.
- respiratory distress syndrome — Also called hyaline membrane disease. an acute lung disease of the newborn, occurring primarily in premature babies and babies born to ill mothers, characterized by rapid breathing, flaring of the nostrils, inelastic lungs, edema of the extremities, and in some cases the formation of a hyaline membrane on the lungs caused by a lack of surfactant in the immature lung tissue. Abbreviation: RDS.
- royal canadian mounted police — Canadian police on horseback
- run something up the flagpole — to pursue a tentative course of action in order to gauge the reaction it receives
- scanning tunneling microscope — a device that uses a moving needle and the tunnel effect to generate a maplike image of the atomic surface structure of matter, thereby achieving even greater magnification than the scanning electron microscope.
- simple mail transfer protocol — (messaging) (SMTP) A protocol defined in STD 10, RFC 821, used to transfer electronic mail between computers, usually over Ethernet. It is a server to server protocol, so other protocols are used to access the messages. The SMTP dialog usually happens in the background under the control of the message transfer agent, e.g. sendmail but it is possible to interact with an SMTP server using telnet to connect to the normal SMTP port, 25. E.g. telnet mhs-relay.ac.uk 25 You should normally start by identifying the local host: HELO wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk You can then issue commands to verify an address or expand an alias: VRFY [email protected] VRFY postmaster or expand a mailing list: EXPN c-help You can even send a message: MAIL From:<[email protected]> RCPT To:<[email protected]> DATA What is the point? . QUIT This is useful if you want to find out exactly what is happening to your message at a certain point. See also Post Office Protocol, RFC 822, sendmail.
- sing from the same hymn sheet — If you say that people, especially people in the same organization, are singing from the same hymn sheet or are singing from the same song sheet, you mean that they are saying the same things in public about something and appear to agree about it.