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28-letter words containing c, i, r, e, n, s

  • electronic transfer of funds — the transfer of money from one bank or building-society account to another by means of a computer link using the telephone network
  • english for special purposes — the practice and theory of learning and teaching English for specific uses in given fields, such as science, nursing, tourism, etc.
  • enterprise investment scheme — (in Britain) a scheme to provide tax relief on investments in certain small companies: came into operation in 1994, when it replaced the Business Expansion Scheme
  • enterprise resource planning — (application, business)   (ERP) Any software system designed to support and automate the business processes of medium and large businesses. This may include manufacturing, distribution, personnel, project management, payroll, and financials. ERP systems are accounting-oriented information systems for identifying and planning the enterprise-wide resources needed to take, make, distribute, and account for customer orders. ERP systems were originally extensions of MRP II systems, but have since widened their scope. An ERP system also differs from the typical MRP II system in technical requirements such as relational database, use of object oriented programming language, computer aided software engineering tools in development, client/server architecture, and open system portability.
  • environmental health service — (in Britain) a service provided by a local authority, which deals with prevention of the spread of communicable diseases, food safety and hygiene, control of infestation by insects or rodents, etc
  • financial services authority — (in the United Kingdom) a regulatory body that oversees London's financial markets, each of which has its own self-regulatory organization: it succeeded the Securities and Investments Board
  • finite intersection property — the property of a collection of nonempty sets in which the intersections of all possible finite numbers of the sets each contain at least one element.
  • floating-point specbaseratio — SPECbase_fp92
  • follicle-stimulating hormone — FSH.
  • formal description technique — (specification, protocol)   (FDT) A formal method for developing telecomunications services and protocols. FDTs range from abstract to implementation-oriented descriptions. All FDTs offer the means for producing unambiguous descriptions of OSI services and protocols in a more precise and comprehensive way than natural language descriptions. They provide a foundation for analysis and verification of a description. The target of analysis and verification may vary from abstract properties to concrete properties. Natural language descriptions remain an essential adjunct to formal description, enabling an unfarmiliar reader to gain rapid insight into the structure and function of services and protocols. Examples of FDTs are LOTOS, Z, SDL, and Estelle.
  • general packet radio service — (communications)   (GPRS) A GSM data transmission technique that transmits and receives data in packets. This contrasts with systems that set up a persistent channel. GPRS makes very efficient use of available radio spectrum, and users pay only for the volume of data sent and received. See also: packet radio.
  • get something off your chest — If you get something off your chest, you talk about something that has been worrying you.
  • greatest happiness principle — the ethical principle that an action is right in so far as it promotes the greatest happiness of the greatest number of those affected
  • high performance file system — (file system)   (HPFS) The native file system for IBM's OS/2.
  • human immunodeficiency virus — See under AIDS virus. Abbreviation: HIV.
  • imperial software technology — (company)   A software engineering company which emerged from Imperial College in about 1982. It enjoys a world-wide reputation for technical excellence as a software product and technology provider in the Open Systems market. Its flagship product is X-Designer, the award-winning graphical user interface builder. It also has considerable expertise in the Z language and Formal Methods.
  • in (good, poor, etc. ) taste — in a form, style, or manner showing a (good, poor, etc.) sense of beauty, excellence, fitness, propriety, etc.
  • infectious laryngotracheitis — a viral disease of adult chickens, characterized by inflammation and hemorrhage of the larynx and trachea and, in many cases, resulting in asphyxiation.
  • instruction address register — (architecture)   (IAR) The IBM name for program counter. The IAR can be accessed by way of a supervisor call in supervisor state, but cannot be directly addressed in problem state.
  • instruction set architecture — (architecture)   (ISA) The parts of a processor's design that need to be understood in order to write assembly language, such as the machine language instructions and registers. Parts of the architecture that are left to the implementation, such as number of superscalar functional units, cache size and cycle speed, are not part of the ISA. The definition of SPARC, for example, carefully distinguishes between an implementation and a specification.
  • integrated drive electronics — Advanced Technology Attachment
  • internet research task force — (IRTF) The IRTF is chartered by the Internet Architecture Board to consider long-term Internet issues from a theoretical point of view. It has Research Groups, similar to Internet Engineering Task Force Working Groups, which are each tasked to discuss different research topics. Multi-cast audio/video conferencing and privacy enhanced mail are samples of IRTF output.
  • karelian autonomous republic — an autonomous republic in the NW Russian Federation in Europe. 66,500 sq. mi. (172,240 sq. km). Capital: Petrozavodsk.
  • lempel-ziv welch compression — (LZW) The algorithm used by the Unix compress command to reduce the size of files, e.g. for archival or transmission. LZW was designed by Terry Welch in 1984 for implementation in hardware for high-performance disk controllers. It is a variant of LZ78, one of the two Lempel-Ziv compression schemes. The LZW algorithm relies on reoccurrence of byte sequences (strings) in its input. It maintains a table mapping input strings to their associated output codes. The table initially contains mappings for all possible strings of length one. Input is taken one byte at a time to find the longest initial string present in the table. The code for that string is output and then the string is extended with one more input byte, b. A new entry is added to the table mapping the extended string to the next unused code (obtained by incrementing a counter). The process repeats, starting from byte b. The number of bits in an output code, and hence the maximum number of entries in the table is usually fixed and once this limit is reached, no more entries are added. LZW compression and decompression are licensed under Unisys Corporation's 1984 U.S. Patent 4,558,302 and equivalent foreign patents. This kind of patent isn't legal in most coutries of the world (including the UK) except the USA. Patents in the UK can't describe algorithms or mathematical methods.
  • level premium term insurance — Level premium term insurance is term insurance with premiums that remain the same throughout the life of the contract.
  • local mail transfer protocol — (messaging, protocol)   (LMTP) A protocol designed as an alternative to ESMTP for cases where the mail receiver does not manage a queue. LMTP is an application level protocol that runs on top of TCP/IP. It was initially defined in RFC 2033, and uses (with a few changes) the syntax and semantics of ESMTP. It should be used only by specific prior arrangement and configuration, and it must not be used on TCP port 25 (the SMTP port).
  • machine-assisted translation — translation done by a human translator who uses computer software to assist with the translation
  • magnetic particle inspection — a method of testing for cracks and other defects in a magnetic material, such as steel, by covering it with a magnetic powder and magnetizing it: any variation in the concentration of the powder indicates a flaw in the material
  • manpower services commission — (in Britain, formerly) an organization providing training for adult workers
  • marriage guidance counsellor — a person whose job is to give advice given to couples who have problems in their married life
  • meter-kilogram-second-ampere — of or relating to the system of units in which the meter, kilogram, second, and ampere are the principal units of length, mass, time, and electric current. Abbreviation: mksa, MKSA.
  • microsoft foundation classes — (programming)   (MFC) Software structures in C++, the Windows base classes which can respond to messages, make windows, and from which application specific classes can be derived.
  • morpheme structure condition — (in generative phonology) a constraint on the occurrence of sounds or sequences of sounds in the phonological representation of morphemes.
  • motion picture experts group — (spelling)   Incorrect expansion of MPEG, which stands for Moving Picture Experts Group.
  • mouth-to-mouth resuscitation — a method of artificial respiration in which a person rhythmically blows air into the victim's lungs, either directly, by placing the mouth over the patient's, or through a tube.
  • moving picture experts group — (compression, standard, algorithm, file format, body)   (MPEG, ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29 WG11) An ISO committee that generates standards for digital video compression and audio. Also the name of their algorithms.
  • multimedia personal computer — (multimedia)   (MPC) A specification published by the Multimedia PC Marketing Council in 1990 to encourage the adoption of a standard multimedia computing platform. In May 1993, the MPC Marketing Council published a new specification called MPC Level 2 Specification as an enhanced multimedia computer standard. The original MPC specification, now also known as the MPC Level 1 Specification, continues in full effect. The appearance of the MPC or MPC2 certification mark on a computer system or upgrade kit indicates that the hardware meets the corresponding (Level 1 or Level 2) MPC Marketing Council specification. Software bearing the Multimedia PC mark has been designed to work on Multimedia PC licensed hardware. By establishing a standard platform, certifying hardware compliance and providing inter-operability between software and hardware for the consumer, the MPC Marketing Council is encouraging widespread use of multimedia applications and hardware.
  • national labor relations act — an act of Congress (1935) that forbade any interference by employers with the formation and operation of labor unions.
  • national savings certificate — (in Britain) a certificate bought from the National Savings department which can be redeemed tax-free with accrued interest, usually after 5 years
  • national semiconductor 32000 — (processor)   (NS32000) The first of a series of microprocessors from National Semiconductor. The 320xx processors have an interface which allows coprocessors such as FPUs and MMUs to be attached in a chain. The 320xx was the predecessor of the Swordfish processor.
  • newly industrialized country — a country that has recently become, or is now in the process of becoming, industrialized
  • north-west frontier province — a province in Pakistan, bordering Punjab and Kashmir on the west: a former province of British India. 28,773 sq. mi. (77,516 sq. km). Capital: Peshawar.
  • not have room to swing a cat — to have very little space
  • object persistence framework — (programming)   (OPF) Any system for storing objects so they can be reloaded into a future session. Typically this will use a relational database along with some kind of object relational mapping. Another typical solution would store objects in XML files (a form of serialisation). One of the trickier problems to solve is how to maintain references between objects, e.g. replacing memory pointers with unique names or identifiers. Virtually identical considerations apply to transferring objects, or indeed any kind of data structure, from one process to another via some communications channel, e.g. a TCP/IP connection.
  • object-oriented polymorphism — (programming)   The kind of polymorphism found in object-oriented programming languages where a variable can refer to an object whose class is not known exactly until run time. A method can use a variable of a given class - call other methods on it, pass it as an argument, etc. - without needing to know to which subclass it refers, as long as its actual class is compatible with those uses.
  • open systems interconnection — (networking)   (OSI-RM, OSI Reference Model, seven layer model) A model of network architecture and a suite of protocols (a protocol stack) to implement it, developed by ISO in 1978 as a framework for international standards in heterogeneous computer network architecture. The OSI architecture is split between seven layers, from lowest to highest: 1 physical layer, 2 data link layer, 3 network layer, 4 transport layer, 5 session layer, 6 presentation layer, 7 application layer. Each layer uses the layer immediately below it and provides a service to the layer above. In some implementations a layer may itself be composed of sub-layers. OSI is the umbrella name for a series of non-proprietary protocols and specifications, comprising, among others, the OSI Reference Model, ASN.1 (Abstract Syntax Notation 1), BER (Basic Encoding Rules), CMIP and CMIS (Common Management Information Protocol and Services), X.400 (Message Handling System, or MHS), X.500 (Directory Service), Z39.50 (search and retrieval protocol used by WAIS), and many others. Apart from its actual application to real protocols, it also serves as a useful teaching model.
  • osborne computer corporation — (company)   The unsucessful computer manufacturer founded by Adam Osborne that produced one of the first laptop computers, the Osborne 1.
  • packet in plastic grid array — (integrated circuit)   (PPGA) The package used for Intel's Celeron Socket 370 CPU.
  • peaches-and-cream complexion — a pale complexion with rosy cheeks
  • persistent organic pollutant — a toxin resulting from a manufacturing process, which remains in the environment for many years
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