27-letter words containing a, s, u, n, c, i
- national science foundation — an independent agency of the executive branch, created in 1950, that promotes and supports research and education in the sciences. Abbreviation: NSF.
- 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 application support — (networking) (NAS) DEC's approach to applications integration across a distributed multivendor environment.
- neurolinguistic programming — a therapy designed to alter behaviour by reprogramming unconscious patterns of thought
- nude descending a staircase — a painting (1912) by Marcel Duchamp.
- open scripting architecture — (OSA) A CIL approach to the coexistence of multiple scripting systems.
- oscillating universe theory — the theory that the universe is oscillating between periods of expansion and collapse
- personal accident insurance — accident which covers personal accidents
- physiological salt solution — isotonic sodium chloride solution.
- polyalphabetic substitution — a system of substitution that mixes together a number of cipher alphabets in a cryptogram so that each plaintext letter is represented by a cipher that repeatedly changes.
- product liability insurance — Product liability insurance is insurance for a producer or supplier of goods against injury to third parties or loss of or damage to their property that is caused by a fault in the goods.
- protestant episcopal church — Episcopal Church in America.
- 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
- public works administration — the U.S. federal agency (1933–44) that instituted and administered projects for the construction of public works. Abbreviation: PWA, P.W.A.
- publius-licinius-valerianus — (Publius Licinius Valerianus) died a.d. c260, Roman emperor 253–60.
- respiratory syncytial virus — a myxovirus causing infections of the nose and throat, esp in young children. It is thought to be involved in some cot deaths
- 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.
- rufus daniel isaacs reading — Rufus Daniel Isaacs, 1st Marquis of, 1860–1935, Lord Chief Justice of England 1913–21; viceroy of India 1921–26.
- sea-launched cruise missile — a cruise missile launched by surface ships or submarines against land or sea targets and equipped with nuclear or conventional warheads, with a range of 2210 miles (3556 km). Abbreviation: SLCM, S.L.C.M.
- 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.
- stanford research institute — Former name of SRI International.
- synchronous optical network — (networking) (SONET) A broadband networking standard based on point-to-point optical fibre networks. SONET will provide a high-bandwidth "pipe" to support ATM-based services. The SONET standard will establish a digital hierarchical network with a consistent worldwide transport scheme. SONET has been designed to take advantage of fibre, in contrast to the plain old telephone system which was designed for copper wires. SONET carries circuit-switched data in frames at speeds in multiples of 51.84 megabits per second (Mbps) up to 48 * 51.84 Mbps = 2.488 gigabits per second. Since SONET uses multiple channels to transmit data, each SONET frame can be considered to be a two-dimensional table of bytes that is 9 rows high and 90 columns deep. For every OC-n level, SONET can transmit n number of frames at a given time. Groups of frames are called superframes. SONET is the American version of SDH.
- to stop dead in your tracks — If someone or something stops you in your tracks, or if you stop dead in your tracks, you suddenly stop moving because you are very surprised, impressed, or frightened.
- 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
- united states naval academy — an institution founded in 1845 at Annapolis, Maryland, for the training of U.S. naval officers.
- universal computer protocol — (communications, protocol) An earlier form of External Machine Interface (EMI).
- 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)
- weapons of mass destruction — nuclear, biological and chemical arms
- xml user-interface language — (language) (XUL) An XML-based language created for the Mozilla browser for development of cross-platform user interfaces. XUL supports input controls such as textboxes and checkboxes, toolbars, menus, dialogs, trees, keyboard shortcuts, and more.
- you can't have it both ways — If someone says that you can't have it both ways, they are telling you that you have to choose between two things and cannot do or have them both.