22-letter words containing a, r, o
- arithmetic progression — a sequence of numbers or quantities, each term of which differs from the succeeding term by a constant amount, such as 3,6,9,12
- armed response vehicle — (in Britain) a police vehicle carrying armed officers who are trained to respond to incidents involving firearms
- ars longa, vita brevis — art (is) long, life (is) short
- arseniuretted hydrogen — arsine (def 1).
- articulatory phonetics — the branch of phonetics concerned with the production of speech sounds
- artificial respiration — Artificial respiration is the forcing of air into the lungs of someone who has stopped breathing, usually by blowing through their mouth or nose, in order to keep them alive and to help them to start breathing again.
- as broad as it is long — amounting to the same thing; without advantage either way
- astronomical telescope — any telescope designed and mounted for use in astronomy. Such telescopes usually form inverted images
- at the top of the tree — in the highest position of a profession, etc
- attachment of earnings — (in Britain) a court order requiring an employer to deduct amounts from an employee's wages to pay debts or honour financial obligations
- audience participation — the active involvement of an audience in a live show or broadcast
- audio video interleave — (multimedia) (AVI) An audio-video standard designed by Microsoft. Apparently proprietary and Microsoft Windows-specific.
- automatic gain control — control of a radio receiver in which the gain varies inversely with the magnitude of the input, thus maintaining the output at an approximately constant level
- automatic send receive — (hardware) (ASR) Part of a designation for a hard-copy terminal, manufactured by Teletype Corporation, which could be commanded remotely to send the contents of its paper tape reader. The ASR-33 was the most common minicomputer terminal in the early 1970s.
- automatic transmission — A car that is fitted with automatic transmission has a gear system in which the gears change automatically.
- autoxidation-reduction — disproportionation.
- axiom of comprehension — (logic) An axiom schema of set theory which states: if P(x) is a property then {x : P} is a set. I.e. all the things with some property form a set. Acceptance of this axiom leads to Russell's Paradox which is why Zermelo set theory replaces it with a restricted form.
- axonometric projection — a geometric drawing of an object, such as a building, in three dimensions showing the verticals and horizontals projected to scale but with diagonals and curves distorted, so that the whole appears inclined
- backward combatability — (humour) /bak'w*d k*m-bat'*-bil'*-tee/ (Play on "backward compatibility") A property of hardware or software revisions in which previous protocols, formats, layouts, etc. are irrevocably discarded in favour of "new and improved" protocols, formats and layouts, leaving the previous ones not merely deprecated but actively defeated. (Too often, the old and new versions cannot definitively be distinguished, such that lingering instances of the previous ones yield crashes or other infelicitous effects, as opposed to a simple "version mismatch" message.) A backward compatible change, on the other hand, allows old versions to coexist without crashes or error messages, but too many major changes incorporating elaborate backward compatibility processing can lead to extreme software bloat. See also flag day.
- backward compatibility — (jargon) Able to share data or commands with older versions of itself, or sometimes other older systems, particularly systems it intends to supplant. Sometimes backward compatibility is limited to being able to read old data but does not extend to being able to write data in a format that can be read by old versions. For example, WordPerfect 6.0 can read WordPerfect 5.1 files, so it is backward compatible. It can be said that Perl is backward compatible with awk, because Perl was (among other things) intended to replace awk, and can, with a converter, run awk programs. See also: backward combatability. Compare: forward compatible.
- backwards and forwards — If someone or something moves backwards and forwards, they move repeatedly first in one direction and then in the opposite direction.
- bacterial endocarditis — a bacterial infection of the inner lining of the heart, most often of the heart valves, characterized by fever, enlarged spleen, and heart murmur.
- badlands national park — a national park in SW South Dakota: rock formations and animal fossils. 380 sq. mi. (985 sq. km).
- baldassare castiglione — Baldassare [bahl-dahs-sah-re] /ˌbɑl dɑsˈsɑ rɛ/ (Show IPA), 1478–1529, Italian diplomat and author.
- ballad of reading gaol — a poem (1898) by Oscar Wilde.
- ballistic galvanometer — a type of galvanometer for measuring surges of current. After deflection the instrument returns slowly to its original reading
- bank deposit insurance — the protection of bank deposits against the insolvency of banks in the U.S., up to a specified maximum per account that is revised periodically, under special insurance through the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.
- bankruptcy proceedings — the legal business of a bankruptcy case
- baptismal regeneration — the doctrine that regeneration and sanctification are received in and through baptism.
- bark up the wrong tree — to misdirect one's attention, efforts, etc; be mistaken
- barra de sao francisco — a city in SE Brazil, on the São Francisco River.
- bartolome de las casas — Bartolomé de las [bahr-taw-law-me th e lahs] /ˌbɑr tɔ lɔˈmɛ ðɛ lɑs/ (Show IPA), Las Casas, Bartolomé de.
- basal body temperature — the lowest temperature the body reaches in the resting state, typically during sleep. It is usually measured on waking
- basic operating system — (operating system) (BOS) An early [when?] IBM operating system. According to folklore, BOS was the predecessor to TOS on the IBM 360 and it was IPL'd from a card reader. It may have been intended for very small 360's with no disks and limited tape drives. BOS died out really early [when?] as disks such as the 2311 and 2314 became common with the IBM 360, whereas disks had been a real luxury on the IBM 7090.
- be in a person's shoes — to be in another person's situation
- be streets ahead of sb — If someone is streets ahead of you, they are much better at something than you are.
- behaviour modification — the use of techniques to change someone's behaviour by reinforcing desired behaviour
- being from outer space — a monster; an imaginary creature
- benoit de sainte-maure — 12th-century French trouvère: author of the Roman de Troie, which contains the episode of Troilus and Cressida
- benzenecarboxylic acid — benzoic acid.
- bereavement counsellor — a person giving advice to bereaved people to help them cope with their grief
- bernoulli's lemniscate — Analytic Geometry. lemniscate.
- bidirectional printing — (hardware) A feature of a printer whose printer head can print both when moving left to right and when moving right to left. Also known as "boustrophedonic".
- big bend national park — a national park in W Texas, on the Rio Grande. 1080 sq. mi. (2800 sq. km).
- biological engineering — bioengineering.
- biomedical engineering — bioengineering (def 1).
- block diagram compiler — (simulation, language) (BDL) A block diagram simulation tool, with associated language.
- block redundancy check — Longitudinal Redundancy Check
- blue-winged kookaburra — a related smaller bird D. Leachii, of tropical Australia and New Guinea
- board of commissioners — the administrative body of a county in many U.S. states, especially in the South and the West, having from two to seven elected members.