18-letter words containing c, g, s
- magic switch story — Some years ago, I was snooping around in the cabinets that housed the MIT AI Lab's PDP-10, and noticed a little switch glued to the frame of one cabinet. It was obviously a homebrew job, added by one of the lab's hardware hackers (no-one knows who). You don't touch an unknown switch on a computer without knowing what it does, because you might crash the computer. The switch was labelled in a most unhelpful way. It had two positions, and scrawled in pencil on the metal switch body were the words "magic" and "more magic". The switch was in the "more magic" position. I called another hacker over to look at it. He had never seen the switch before either. Closer examination revealed that the switch had only one wire running to it! The other end of the wire did disappear into the maze of wires inside the computer, but it's a basic fact of electricity that a switch can't do anything unless there are two wires connected to it. This switch had a wire connected on one side and no wire on its other side. It was clear that this switch was someone's idea of a silly joke. Convinced by our reasoning that the switch was inoperative, we flipped it. The computer instantly crashed. Imagine our utter astonishment. We wrote it off as coincidence, but nevertheless restored the switch to the "more magic" position before reviving the computer. A year later, I told this story to yet another hacker, David Moon as I recall. He clearly doubted my sanity, or suspected me of a supernatural belief in the power of this switch, or perhaps thought I was fooling him with a bogus saga. To prove it to him, I showed him the very switch, still glued to the cabinet frame with only one wire connected to it, still in the "more magic" position. We scrutinized the switch and its lone connection, and found that the other end of the wire, though connected to the computer wiring, was connected to a ground pin. That clearly made the switch doubly useless: not only was it electrically nonoperative, but it was connected to a place that couldn't affect anything anyway. So we flipped the switch. The computer promptly crashed. This time we ran for Richard Greenblatt, a long-time MIT hacker, who was close at hand. He had never noticed the switch before, either. He inspected it, concluded it was useless, got some diagonal cutters and diked it out. We then revived the computer and it has run fine ever since. We still don't know how the switch crashed the machine. There is a theory that some circuit near the ground pin was marginal, and flipping the switch changed the electrical capacitance enough to upset the circuit as millionth-of-a-second pulses went through it. But we'll never know for sure; all we can really say is that the switch was magic. I still have that switch in my basement. Maybe I'm silly, but I usually keep it set on "more magic".
- magistrate's court — a court having limited jurisdiction over minor civil and criminal matters, as matters of contract not exceeding a particular amount of money.
- magistrates' court — law: handles minor crimes
- magnesium silicate — a white powder, 3MgSiO 3 ⋅5H 2 O, with variable hydration, insoluble in water or alcohol, used as a rubber filler, a bleaching agent, an odor absorbent, and in the manufacture of paints and resins.
- magnetic resonance — the response by atoms, molecules, or nuclei subjected to a magnetic field to radio waves or other forms of energy: used in medicine for scanning
- magnetocrystalline — (physics) Describing the interaction between the magnetization and the crystal structure of a material.
- magnetogasdynamics — magnetohydrodynamics.
- malicious wounding — the intentional violent wounding or injuring of someone
- manufactured goods — products made by machine
- manufacturing base — the manufacturing industries of an area or a country considered as a unit and a constituent part of the economy
- marketing research — the study of influences upon customer and consumer behaviour and the analysis of market characteristics and trends
- mechanical testing — Mechanical testing is the testing of a material to find out its mechanical properties, for example its yield strength or hardness.
- member of congress — law: elected representative
- menthol cigarettes — cigarettes that are flavoured with menthol
- micrometeorologist — a person who specializes in micrometeorology
- microsoft exchange — (messaging) Microsoft's messaging and enterprise collaboration server. Exchange's primary role is as an electronic mail message store but it can also store calendars, task lists, contact details, and other data.
- moccasin telegraph — the transmission of rumour or secret information; the grapevine
- molecular genetics — a subdivision of genetics concerned with the structure and function of genes at the molecular level.
- monographic series — a series of monographs issued in uniform style or format and related by subject or by issuing agency.
- mortgage insurance — policy to compensate for property loan payments
- negative cash flow — the situation when income is less than payments
- netscape navigator — (networking, tool, product) /Mozilla/ (Often called just "Netscape") A web browser from Netscape Communications Corporation. The first beta-test version was released free to the Internet on 13 October 1994. Netscape evolved from NCSA Mosaic (with which it shares at least one author) and runs on the X Window System under various versions of Unix, on Microsoft Windows and on the Apple Macintosh. It features integrated support for sending electronic mail and reading Usenet news, as well as RSA encryption to allow secure communications for commercial applications such as exchanging credit card numbers with net retailers. It provides multiple simultaneous interruptible text and image loading; native inline JPEG image display; display and interaction with documents as they load; multiple independent windows. Netscape was designed with 14.4 kbps modem links in mind. You can download Netscape Navigator for evaluation, or for unlimited use in academic or not-for-profit environments. You can also pay for it. Version: 1.0N. E-mail: <[email protected]>.
- neurophysiological — the branch of physiology dealing with the functions of the nervous system.
- neuropsychological — Of or pertaining to neuropsychology, the relation or combination of brain and mind.
- neutrosophic logic — (logic) (Or "Smarandache logic") A generalisation of fuzzy logic based on Neutrosophy. A proposition is t true, i indeterminate, and f false, where t, i, and f are real values from the ranges T, I, F, with no restriction on T, I, F, or the sum n=t+i+f. Neutrosophic logic thus generalises: - intuitionistic logic, which supports incomplete theories (for 0
- nicotine poisoning — a toxic effect caused by nicotine
- nightmare scenario — If you describe a situation or event as a nightmare scenario, you mean that it is the worst possible thing that could happen.
- nonaggression pact — an agreement between two nations not to attack each other, usually for a specified period of years
- office of readings — the first of the canonical hours; matins
- organic solidarity — social cohesiveness that is based on division of labor and interdependence and is characteristic of complex, industrial societies.
- orthopedic surgery — corrective operation on bones or joints
- orthotungstic acid — an oxyacid acid of tungsten. Formula: H2WO4
- oscillating engine — a steam engine having piston rods connected directly to the crankshaft and cylinders oscillating on trunnions.
- oscillographically — By means of oscillography.
- osteogenic sarcoma — osteosarcoma
- paediatric nursing — the branch of nursing concerned with the care of children
- paleoclimatologist — the branch of paleogeography dealing with the study of paleoclimates.
- palm beach gardens — a city in SE Florida, near North Palm Beach.
- percussion flaking — a method of forming a flint tool by striking flakes from a stone core with another stone or a piece of bone or wood.
- percussion welding — a form of resistance welding in which the required pressure is provided by a hammerlike blow.
- phantasmagorically — having a fantastic or deceptive appearance, as something in a dream or created by the imagination.
- photochemical smog — air pollution containing ozone and other reactive chemical compounds formed by the action of sunlight on nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons, especially those in automobile exhaust.
- physical geography — the branch of geography concerned with natural features and phenomena of the earth's surface, as landforms, drainage features, climates, soils, and vegetation.
- positively charged — having a positive charge
- postal storage car — a railroad car for transporting unsorted mail.
- pragmatic sanction — any one of various imperial decrees with the effect of fundamental law.
- precedence lossage — /pre's*-dens los'*j/ A misunderstanding of operator precedence resulting in unintended grouping of arithmetic or logical operators when coding an expression. Used especially of mistakes in C code due to the nonintuitively low precedence of "&", "|", "^", "<<" and ">>". For example, the following C expression, intended to test the least significant bit of x, x & 1 == 0 is parsed as x & (1 == 0) which is always zero (false). Some lazy programmers ignore precedence and parenthesise everything. Lisp fans enjoy pointing out that this can't happen in *their* favourite language, which eschews precedence entirely, requiring one to use explicit parentheses everywhere.
- premiere screening — the first screening of a film at a cinema, etc
- process scheduling — multitasking
- procrustean string — (programming) A fixed-length string. If a string value is too long for the allocated space, it is truncated to fit; and if it is shorter, the empty space is padded, usually with space characters. This is an allusion to Procrustes, a legendary robber of ancient Attica. He bound his victims to a bed, and if they were shorter than the bed, he stretched their limbs until they would fit; if their limbs were longer, he lopped them off.