15-letter words containing a, r, o, w, i
- share ownership — the owning of shares in a company
- shortwave radio — a radio that transmits or receives shortwaves.
- spawning ground — a place where fish deposit their eggs for fertilization
- stalactite work — (in Islamic architecture) intricate decorative corbeling in the form of brackets, squinches, and portions of pointed vaults.
- starfish flower — carrion flower (def 2).
- stationary wave — standing wave.
- straightforward — going or directed straight ahead: a straightforward gaze.
- streamline flow — the flow of a fluid past an object such that the velocity at any fixed point in the fluid is constant or varies in a regular manner.
- swiss army code — (programming, humour) Code for an application that is suffering from feature creep. Swiss Army Code does many things, but does none of them well.
- thankworthiness — the state or quality of being thankworthy or deserving thanks
- the working man — working class people collectively
- thorndike's law — the principle that all learnt behaviour is regulated by rewards and punishments, proposed by Edward Lee Thorndike (1874–1949), US psychologist
- to carry weight — If a person or their opinion carries weight, they are respected and are able to influence people.
- towers of hanoi — (games) A classic computer science problem, invented by Edouard Lucas in 1883, often used as an example of recursion. "In the great temple at Benares, says he, beneath the dome which marks the centre of the world, rests a brass plate in which are fixed three diamond needles, each a cubit high and as thick as the body of a bee. On one of these needles, at the creation, God placed sixty-four discs of pure gold, the largest disc resting on the brass plate, and the others getting smaller and smaller up to the top one. This is the Tower of Bramah. Day and night unceasingly the priests transfer the discs from one diamond needle to another according to the fixed and immutable laws of Bramah, which require that the priest on duty must not move more than one disc at a time and that he must place this disc on a needle so that there is no smaller disc below it. When the sixty-four discs shall have been thus transferred from the needle on which at the creation God placed them to one of the other needles, tower, temple, and Brahmins alike will crumble into dust, and with a thunderclap the world will vanish." The recursive solution is: Solve for n-1 discs recursively, then move the remaining largest disc to the free needle. Note that there is also a non-recursive solution: On odd-numbered moves, move the smallest sized disk clockwise. On even-numbered moves, make the single other move which is possible.
- transfer window — the period during the year in which a football club can transfer players from other teams into their own
- twist one's arm — to combine, as two or more strands or threads, by winding together; intertwine.
- unseaworthiness — constructed, outfitted, manned, and in all respects fitted for a voyage at sea.
- upward mobility — movement from one social level to a higher one (upward mobility) or a lower one (downward mobility) as by changing jobs or marrying.
- upwardly mobile — See under vertical mobility (def 1).
- w.h. richardson — Henry Handel (Henrietta Richardson Robertson) 1870–1946, Australian novelist.
- warrant officer — (in the U.S. Armed Forces) an officer of one of four grades ranking above enlisted personnel and below commissioned officers.
- water authority — an official body which is responsible for providing water
- water pollution — the pollution of the sea and rivers
- weapons carrier — a light truck for transporting weapons or munitions in the field.
- weather station — an installation equipped and used for meteorological observation.
- weatherboarding — an early type of board used as a siding for a building.
- weatherproofing — Present participle of weatherproof.
- weekend warrior — a reservist who attends weekend meetings of his or her unit in order to fulfill military obligations.
- welfare officer — a person who gives people help and advice
- wheelchairbound — Confined to a wheelchair.
- white cast iron — cast iron having most or all of its carbon in the form of cementite and exhibiting a silvery fracture.
- white snakeroot — a North American plant, Eupatorium urticaefolium, the roots or rhizomes of which have been used as a remedy for snakebite
- wilderness road — a 300-mile (500-km) route from eastern Virginia through the Cumberland Gap into Kentucky, explored by Daniel Boone in 1769 and marked as a trail by him and other pioneers in 1775: a major route for early settlers moving west.
- windfall profit — a profit that arises thanks to an external event over which the person profiting had no control
- winter holidays — a period of rest from work or studies taken in winter
- with good grace — elegance or beauty of form, manner, motion, or action: We watched her skate with effortless grace across the ice. Synonyms: attractiveness, charm, gracefulness, comeliness, ease, lissomeness, fluidity. Antonyms: stiffness, ugliness, awkwardness, clumsiness; klutziness.
- with one accord — If a number of people do something with one accord, they do it together or at the same time, because they agree about what should be done.
- wolverine state — Michigan (used as a nickname).
- worcester china — porcelain articles made in Worcester (England) from 1751 in a factory that became, in 1862, the Royal Worcester Porcelain Company
- working capital — the amount of capital needed to carry on a business.
- working drawing — an accurately measured and detailed drawing of a structure, machine, etc., or of any part of one, used as a guide to workers in constructing it.
- working holiday — trip combining vacation with job experience
- working storage — the amount of memory used to temporarily store results or other data while a program is running.
- world-wide wait — (humour) A pejorative expansion of WWW reflecting on the slowness of some network connections and sites.
- yellow mandarin — (in the Chinese Empire) a member of any of the nine ranks of public officials, each distinguished by a particular kind of button worn on the cap.