18-letter words containing b, o, s, d
- deep-discount bond — a fixed-interest security that pays little or no interest but is issued at a substantial discount to its redemption value, thus largely substituting capital gain for income
- depository library — a library designated by law to receive without charge all or a selection of the official publications of a government.
- desktop publishing — Desktop publishing is the production of printed materials such as newspapers and magazines using a desktop computer and a laser printer, rather than using conventional printing methods. The abbreviation DTP is also used.
- didaskaleinophobia — The fear of going to school.
- diethylstilbestrol — a nonsteroidal synthetic estrogen, C 18 H 20 O 2 , used in medicine chiefly in the treatment of menopausal symptoms and in animal feeds for chemical caponization: formerly used during pregnancy for the prevention of miscarriage but discontinued owing to its association with an increased risk of vaginal and cervical cancers in women having had fetal exposure. Abbreviation: DES.
- disability pension — a pension paid to people who are unable to continue to work because of a disability
- distributed memory — (architecture) The kind of memory in a parallel processor where each processor has fast access to its own local memory and where to access another processor's memory it must send a message via the inter-processor network. Opposite: shared memory.
- distribution class — form class
- distribution curve — the curve or line of a graph in which cumulative frequencies are plotted as ordinates and values of the variate as abscissas.
- distribution ratio — the ratio of concentrations of a solute distributed between two immiscible solvents in contact with each other, as iodine in water and chloroform
- division of labour — a system of organizing the manufacture of an article in a series of separate specialized operations, each of which is carried out by a different worker or group of workers
- double white lines — parallel white lines on a roadway, usually indicating a barrier to crossing
- double-edged sword — sth that can be both positive and negative
- double-page spread — two pages treated as one in a publication, with images or text extending across the binding
- doubly linked list — (programming) A data structure in which each element contains pointers to the next and previous elements in the list, thus forming a bidirectional linear list.
- engelbart, douglas — Douglas Engelbart
- fire and brimstone — When people talk about fire and brimstone, they are referring to hell and how they think people are punished there after death.
- fire-and-brimstone — threatening punishment in the hereafter: a fire-and-brimstone sermon.
- gamma distribution — a continuous two-parameter distribution from which the chi-square and exponential distributions are derived, written Gamma (α. β), where α and β are greater than zero, and defined in terms of the gamma function
- happy as a sandboy — very happy; high-spirited
- have words with sb — If one person has words with another, or if two or more people have words, they have a serious discussion or argument, especially because one has complained about the other's behaviour.
- how the wind blows — air in natural motion, as that moving horizontally at any velocity along the earth's surface: A gentle wind blew through the valley. High winds were forecast.
- hydrofluorocarbons — Plural form of hydrofluorocarbon.
- ifs, ands, or buts — a supposition; uncertain possibility: The future is full of ifs.
- inconsiderableness — Quality of being inconsiderable.
- knotted cranesbill — a British wildflower, Geranium nodosum, an meadow geranium with bright pink or purple flowers
- known lazy bastard — (abuse) (KLB) A term, used among technical support staff, for a user who repeatedly asks for help with problems whose solutions are clearly explained in the documentation, and persists in doing so after having been told to RTFM. KLBs are singled out for special treatment (i.e. ridicule), especially if they have been heard to say "It's so boring to read the manual! Why don't you just tell me?". The deepest pit in Hell is reserved for KLBs whose questions reveal total ignorance of the basic concepts (e.g., "How do I make a font in Excel?", "Where do I turn on my RAM?"), and who refuse to accept that their questions are neither simple nor well-formed.
- lambda abstraction — A term in lambda-calculus denoting a function. A lambda abstraction begins with a lower-case lambda (represented as "\" in this document), followed by a variable name (the "bound variable"), a full stop and a lambda expression (the body). The body is taken to extend as far to the right as possible so, for example an expression, \ x . \ y . x+y is read as \ x . (\ y . x+y). A nested abstraction such as this is often abbreviated to: \ x y . x + y The lambda expression (\ v . E) denotes a function which takes an argument and returns the term E with all free occurrences of v replaced by the actual argument. Application is represented by juxtaposition so (\ x . x) 42 represents the identity function applied to the constant 42. A lambda abstraction in Lisp is written as the symbol lambda, a list of zero or more variable names and a list of zero or more terms, e.g. (lambda (x y) (plus x y)) Lambda expressions in Haskell are written as a backslash, "\", one or more patterns (e.g. variable names), "->" and an expression, e.g. \ x -> x.
- lincoln's birthday — February 12, a legal holiday in some states of the U.S., in honor of the birth of Abraham Lincoln.
- liquid distributor — A liquid distributor is a device which is used to spread liquid when it enters a packed column (= a tall vessel with packing, used for separating substances).
- loschmidt's number — the number of molecules in one cubic centimeter of an ideal gas at standard temperature and pressure, equal to 2.687 × 10 19.
- love-lies-bleeding — an amaranth, especially Amaranthus caudatus, having spikes of crimson flowers.
- low blood pressure — hypotension.
- master boot record — (operating system, storage) A special area on a computer's main hard disk that gives the location of the disk's boot block or bootable partition where the operating system is installed.
- metabolic syndrome — Pathology. a group of medical conditions present simultaneously in a patient, as high blood pressure, low HDL cholesterol levels, and an excess of abdominal fat, that increases a person's risk of heart disease, stroke, and diabetes. Also called insulin resistance syndrome.
- mobile data system — a system consisting of a client computer requesting information and a server supplying this information
- mohammed ibn-kasim — flourished early 8th century a.d, Muslim conqueror of the Sind region in India.
- non-understandable — capable of being understood; comprehensible.
- north bedfordshire — a city in Bedfordshire, in central England.
- notifiable disease — any one of a number of infectious diseases of humans and animals, that must be reported to the public health authorities
- objective idealism — a form of idealism asserting that the act of experiencing has a reality combining and transcending the natures of the object experienced and of the mind of the observer.
- on one's beam-ends — out of resources; destitute
- one's heart bleeds — used to express sympathetic grief, but often used ironically
- open pandora's box — If someone or something opens Pandora's box or opens a Pandora's box, they do something that causes a lot of problems to appear that did not exist or were not known about before.
- personal bodyguard — a person employed to protect a particular person
- price on sb's head — If there is a price on someone 's head, an amount of money has been offered for the capture or killing of that person.
- productivity bonus — an extra payment made to workers for being more productive or yielding more favourable results than normal
- prometheus unbound — a drama in verse (1820) by Shelley.
- pseudotuberculosis — an acute, sometimes fatal disease of rodents, birds, and other animals, including humans, caused by the bacterium Yersinia (Pasteurella) pseudotuberculosis, and characterized by the formation of nodules resembling those that result from tuberculosis.
- rheims-douay bible — Douay Bible.