17-letter words containing b, o, m, l
- monarch butterfly — a large, deep-orange butterfly, Danaus plexippus, having black and white markings, the larvae of which feed on the leaves of milkweed.
- movable-do system — a system of solmization in which the syllable do can be transposed to the tonic of any key.
- move one's bowels — to pass waste matter from the large intestine; defecate
- national assembly — the body constituted by the French Third Estate in June 1789 after the calling of the Estates General. It was dissolved in Sept 1791 to be replaced by the new Legislative Assembly
- object complement — a word or a group of words used in the predicate following a factitive verb and referring to its direct object, as treasurer in We appointed him treasurer, white in They painted the house white, or an interesting speaker in They thought him an interesting speaker.
- office by example — (language) (OBE) A sequel to QBE, described in publications by Moshe Zloof of IBM in the early 1980s but apparently never implemented.
- old contemptibles — the British expeditionary force to France in 1914
- paleobiochemistry — the study of biochemical processes that occurred in fossil life forms.
- phantom limb pain — a phenomenon characterized by the experience of pain, discomfort, or other sensation in the area of a missing limb or other body part, as a breast.
- phlebotomus fever — sandfly fever.
- plains of abraham — a high plain adjoining the city of Quebec, Canada: battlefield where the English under Wolfe defeated the French under Montcalm in 1759.
- plateau's problem — the problem in the calculus of variations of finding the surface with the least area bounded by a given closed curve in space.
- plymouth brethren — a religious sect founded c. 1827, strongly Puritanical in outlook and prohibiting many secular occupations for its members. It combines elements of Calvinism, Pietism, and millenarianism, and has no organized ministry
- portable computer — (computer) (Commonly, "laptop") A portable personal computer you can carry with one hand. Some laptops run so hot that it would be quite uncomforable to actually use them on your lap for long. The term "notebook" is often used to describe these, though it also implies a low weight (less than 2kg). A "luggable" is one you could carry in one hand but is so heavy you wouldn't want to. One that can by easily operated while held in one hand is a "palmtop". The computer considered by most historians to be the first true portable computer was the Osborne 1 but see the link below for other contenders.
- republic of yemen — Republic of, a country in S Arabia, formed in 1990 by the merger of the Yemen Arab Republic and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen. 207,000 sq. mi. (536,130 sq. km). Capital: Aden.
- self-incompatible — not capable of self-pollination.
- semi-biographical — of or relating to a person's life: He's gathering biographical data for his book on Milton.
- sleeping problems — difficulties in getting to sleep or in staying asleep
- smokeless tobacco — snuff1 (def 9).
- star of bethlehem — the star that is supposed to have appeared above Bethlehem at the birth of Christ
- star-of-bethlehem — any of several plants belonging to the genus Ornithogalum, of the lily family, having grasslike leaves and clusters of white flowers.
- symbolic assembly — (language) An early system on the IBM 705.
- symbolic language — a specialized language dependent upon the use of symbols for communication and created for the purpose of achieving greater exactitude, as in symbolic logic or mathematics.
- synovial membrane — anatomy: connective tissue
- tabernacle mirror — a mirror of c1800, having columns and a cornice, usually gilt, with a painted panel over the mirror.
- teething problems — If a project or new product has teething problems, it has problems in its early stages or when it first becomes available.
- telephone numbers — extremely large numbers, esp in reference to salaries or prices
- temporomandibular — of, relating to, or situated near the hinge joint formed by the lower jaw and the temporal bone of the skull.
- to eat humble pie — If you eat humble pie, you speak or behave in a way which tells people that you admit you were wrong about something.
- triboluminescence — luminescence produced by friction, usually within a crystalline substance.
- trouble came back — (jargon) (TCB) An IBM term for an intermittent or difficult-to-reproduce problem that has failed to respond to neglect or shotgun debugging. Compare heisenbug.
- ultramicrobalance — a balance for weighing precisely, to a hundredth of a microgram or less, minute quantities of material.
- uncle tom's cabin — an antislavery novel (1852) by Harriet Beecher Stowe.
- uncomfortableness — causing discomfort or distress; painful; irritating.
- urban development — the development or improvement of an urban area by building
- variable-geometry — denoting an aircraft in which the wings are hinged to give the variable aspect ratio colloquially known as a swing-wing
- vertical mobility — movement from one social level to a higher one (upward mobility) or a lower one (downward mobility) as by changing jobs or marrying.
- vitamin b complex — an important group of water-soluble vitamins containing vitamin B 1 , vitamin B 2 , etc.
- wearable computer — a small computer that is worn or carried on the body; a wearable computing device: a wrist-worn wearable computer with a head-mounted display.
- welshman's button — an angler's name for a species of caddis fly, Sericostoma personatum