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19-letter words containing b, o, s, u, n

  • double yellow lines — parallel yellow lines painted down the centre of a roadway to indicate that overtaking is not permitted in either direction
  • double-density disk — a disk with more than the normal capacity for storage
  • east dunbartonshire — a council area of central Scotland to the N of Glasgow: part of Strathclyde region from 1975 until 1996: mainly agricultural and residential. Administrative centre: Kirkintilloch. Pop: 106 970 (2003 est). Area: 172 sq km (66 sq miles)
  • feel strongly about — to have decided opinions concerning
  • financial ombudsman — any of five British ombudsmen: the Banking Ombudsman, set up in 1986 to investigate complaints from bank customers; the Building Society Ombudsman, set up in 1987 to investigate complaints from building society customers; the Insurance Ombudsman, set up in 1981 to investigate complaints by policyholders (since 1988 this ombudsman has also operated a Unit Trust Ombudsman scheme); the Investment Ombudsman set up in 1989 to investigate complaints by investors (the Personal Investment Authority Ombudsman is responsible for investigating complaints by personal investors); and the Pensions Ombudsman, set up in 1993 to investigate complaints regarding pension schemes
  • foundation subjects — the subjects studied as part of the National Curriculum, including the compulsory core subjects
  • functional database — (database, language)   A database which uses a functional language as its query language. Databases would seem to be an inappropriate application for functional languages since, a purely functional language would have to return a new copy of the entire database every time (part of) it was updated. To be practically scalable, the update mechanism must clearly be destructive rather than functional; however it is quite feasible for the query language to be purely functional so long as the database is considered as an argument. One approach to the update problem would use a monad to encapsulate database access and ensure it was single threaded. Alternative approaches have been suggested by Trinder, who suggests non-destructive updating with shared data structures, and Sutton who uses a variant of a Phil Wadler's linear type system. There are two main classes of functional database languages. The first is based upon Backus' FP language, of which FQL is probably the best known example. Adaplan is a more recent language which falls into this category. More recently, people have been working on languages which are syntactically very similar to modern functional programming languages, but which also provide all of the features of a database language, e.g. bulk data structures which can be incrementally updated, type systems which can be incrementally updated, and all data persisting in a database. Examples are PFL [Poulovassilis&Small, VLDB-91], and Machiavelli [Ohori et al, ACM SIGMOD Conference, 1998].
  • go down the tube(s) — If a business, economy, or institution goes down the tubes or goes down the tube, it fails or collapses completely.
  • green mountain boys — the members of the armed bands of Vermont organized in 1770 to oppose New York's territorial claims. Under Ethan Allen they won fame in the War of American Independence
  • handlebar moustache — a man's moustache having long, curved ends that resemble the handlebars of a bicycle.
  • have one's blood up — to be or cause to be angry or inflamed
  • heat of sublimation — the heat absorbed by one gram or unit mass of a substance in the process of changing, at a constant temperature and pressure, from a solid to a gaseous state. Compare sublime (def 10).
  • incommensurableness — (rare) Incommensurability.
  • internal-combustion — of or relating to an internal-combustion engine.
  • isobutyl propionate — a colorless liquid, C 7 H 14 O 2 , used chiefly as a paint, varnish, and lacquer solvent.
  • isthmus of san blas — the narrowest part of the Isthmus of Panama. Width: about 50 km (30 miles)
  • keyboard instrument — any musical instrument that is played using a keyboard
  • knights of columbus — an international fraternal and benevolent organization of Roman Catholic men, founded in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1882.
  • look sb up and down — If someone looks you up and down, they direct their eyes from your head to your feet, in a rude and superior way and often as though they disapprove of you.
  • louis ii de bourbon — Condé, Prince de.
  • magnesium carbonate — a white powder, MgCO 3 , insoluble in water and alcohol, soluble in acids, used in dentifrices and cosmetics, in medicine as an antacid, and as a refractory material.
  • make no bones about — Anatomy, Zoology. one of the structures composing the skeleton of a vertebrate. the hard connective tissue forming the substance of the skeleton of most vertebrates, composed of a collagen-rich organic matrix impregnated with calcium, phosphate, and other minerals.
  • membership function — fuzzy subset
  • mutual masturbation — the act of two or more people masturbating each other
  • nominative absolute — a construction consisting in English of a noun, noun phrase, or pronoun in the nominative case followed by a predicate lacking a finite verb, used as a loose modifier of the whole sentence, as the play done in The play done, the audience left the theater.
  • non-distinguishable — to mark off as different (often followed by from or by): He was distinguished from the other boys by his height.
  • normal distribution — a theoretical frequency distribution represented by a normal curve.
  • obsolescence clause — a clause in an insurance policy that takes account of the obsolescence of the item insured in order to lower the amount to be paid out in the event of a claim
  • pointe-aux-trembles — a city in S Quebec, in E Canada, N of Montreal, on the St. Lawrence.
  • potassium carbonate — a white, granular, water-soluble powder, K 2 CO 3 , used chiefly in the manufacture of soap, glass, and potassium salts.
  • provably unsolvable — The set or property of problems for which no algorithm at all exists. E.g. the Halting Problem. See also provably difficult.
  • pseudorandom number — (programming)   One of a sequence of numbers generated by some algorithm so as to have an even distribution over some range of values and minimal correlation between successive values. Pseudorandom numbers are used in simulation and encryption. They are pseudorandom not random because the sequence eventually repeats exactly and is entirely determined by the initial conditions. One of the simplest algorithms is x[i+1] = (a * x[i] + c) mod m but this repeats after at most m numbers and successive numbers are closely related. Better algorithms generally use more previous numbers to calculate the next number.
  • put one's back into — to devote all one's strength to (a task)
  • queen anne's bounty — a fund formed by Queen Anne in 1704 for the augmentation of the livings of the poorer Anglican clergy. In 1948 the administrators of the fund were replaced by the Church Commissioners for England
  • registration number — number on vehicle licence plate
  • semibituminous coal — a coal intermediate between bituminous and anthracite coal in hardness, yielding the maximum heat of any ordinary steam coal.
  • seminiferous tubule — any of the coiled tubules of the testis in which spermatozoa are produced.
  • short-tail business — Short-tail business is insurance business where it is known that claims will be made and settled quickly.
  • southern crab apple — a tree, Malus angustifolia, of the eastern U.S., having oblong leaves, fragrant, pink or rose-colored flowers, and small, round, yellow-green fruit.
  • standing broad jump — a jump for distance from a standing position.
  • stationery cupboard — a cupboard where things like paper, pens and paper clips are kept
  • store refurbishment — Store refurbishment happens when a store needs to be redecorated, modernized or the layout changed. The store will often be closed to customers during this time.
  • subsistence economy — an economy which produces only enough output for its own consumption and does not attempt to accumulate wealth
  • substitution cipher — a cipher that replaces letters of the plain text with another set of letters or symbols.
  • the compassion club — (in Canada) a nonprofit organization that provides uncontaminated cannabis for medical purposes and natural therapies in a safe environment
  • thumb one's nose at — to deride or mock, esp by placing the thumb on the nose with fingers extended
  • to be full of beans — If someone is full of beans, they are very lively and have a lot of energy and enthusiasm.
  • to be running short — If you are running short of something or running low on something, you do not have much of it left. If a supply of something is running short or running low, there is not much of it left.
  • to plumb new depths — If you say that something plumbs new depths, you mean that it is worse than all the things of its kind that have existed before, even though some of them have been very bad.
  • to rack your brains — If you rack your brains, you try very hard to think of something.
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