23-letter words containing c, t, e, r
- to do intelligence work — to serve in the Intelligence Corps; to collect and analyze military information
- to force someone's hand — If you force someone's hand, you force them to act sooner than they want to, or to act in public when they would prefer to keep their actions secret.
- to have a police record — If you say that somebody has a police record, you mean that they have committed a crime or crimes and the police have a record of this.
- to keep a straight face — If you manage to keep a straight face, you manage to look serious, although you want to laugh.
- to keep your nose clean — If you keep your nose clean, you behave well and stay out of trouble.
- to make your skin crawl — If something makes your skin crawl or makes your flesh crawl, it makes you feel shocked or disgusted.
- to outstay your welcome — If you say that someone outstays their welcome or overstays their welcome, you mean that they stay somewhere longer than they are wanted or expected to.
- to pluck up the courage — If you pluck up the courage to do something that you feel nervous about, you make an effort to be brave enough to do it.
- to rise to the occasion — If you say that someone rose to the occasion, you mean that they did what was necessary to successfully overcome a difficult situation.
- to your heart's content — as much as you please
- track and field athlete — a sportsperson who participates in events that involve running, sprinting, throwing, jumping and walking
- traffic-light labelling — a system of food labelling in which red, amber, and green symbols are used to indicate whether the food contains high, medium, or low amounts of sugar, fat, salt, etc
- transcendental analytic — (in transcendental logic) the study of the means by which the mind categorizes data from the sensory manifold.
- transcendental argument — an argument designed to make explicit the conditions under which a certain kind of knowledge is possible, esp those of Kant
- transcendental equation — an equation that involves transcendental functions.
- transcendental function — a function that is not an algebraic function.
- transcendental idealism — the Kantian doctrine that reality consists not of appearances, but of some other order of being whose existence can be inferred from the nature of human reason
- transfer characteristic — the relationship between output and input of an electronic or electromechanical system, esp as depicted graphically
- trellis code modulation — (TCM) A modulation technique with hardware error detection and correction.
- trigonal trisoctahedron — a trisoctahedron whose faces are triangles.
- turn a cold shoulder to — to treat with disdain; snub
- twin-lens reflex camera — a camera in which the image appears on a ground-glass viewer (focusing screen) after being reflected by a mirror or after passing through a prism or semitransparent glass; in one type (single-lens reflex camera) light passes through the same lens to both the ground glass and the film, while in another type (twin-lens reflex camera) light passes through one lens (viewing lens) to the ground glass and through a second lens (taking lens) to the film, the lenses being mechanically coupled for focusing.
- ulster defence regiment — a former reserve regiment of the British Army based in Northern Ireland
- unconditional discharge — the release of a defendant without having to spend time on parole or probation
- unconstitutional strike — a stoppage of work which violates the dispute procedure agreed between the employer and the trade union or trade unions concerned
- under the circumstances — a condition, detail, part, or attribute, with respect to time, place, manner,agent, etc., that accompanies, determines, or modifies a fact or event; a modifying or influencing factor: Do not judge his behavior without considering every circumstance.
- unincorporated business — a privately owned business, often owned by one person who has unlimited liability as the business is not legally registered as a company
- unipress software, inc. — (company) A developer and distributor of Unix software. They produce PC-UNIX connectivity software, development tools and applications and provide technical support and maintenance, porting services, training and consulting.
- united church of canada — the largest Protestant denomination in Canada, formed in the 1920s by incorporating some Presbyterians and most Methodists
- united church of christ — an American Protestant denomination formed in 1957 by a union of the Evangelical and Reformed churches and the Congregational Christian churches.
- united methodist church — the largest denomination of the Methodist church in the U.S., formed in 1939 from the merger of the Methodist Episcopal Church, the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and the Methodist Protestant Church, with the addition in 1968 of the Evangelical United Brethren.
- united states air force — the permanent or regular military air force of the United States, established in 1947 as a separate service under the authority of the Department of Defense: a branch of the U.S. Army before 1947. Abbreviation: USAF.
- universal character set — (character, standard) (UCS, ISO/IEC 10646) A 1993 ISO and IEC standard character set, also known as "Universal Multiple-Octet Coded Character Set". UCS comes in a 16-bit variant called UCS-2 and a 32-bit variant called UCS-4, which is composed of 16-bit UCS-2 "planes". So far only one 16-bit plane has been defined, which is known as the Basic Multilingual Plane. The implementation of UCS is still in its infancy, though some moves, such as the Java language defining a character to be 16 bits, are suggestive.
- unprotected intercourse — an act of sexual intercourse or sodomy performed without the use of a condom thus involving the risk of sexually transmitted diseases
- urban conservation area — an urban area that is protected, preserved and carefully managed
- urinary tract infection — infection of any part of the urinary tract, especially the urethra or bladder, usually caused by a bacterium, Escherichia coli, and often precipitated by increased sexual activity, vaginitis, enlargement of the prostate, or stress. Abbreviation: UTI.
- user interface language — (language, graphics) (UIL) A language for specifying widget hierarchies etc. in OSF/Motif and DECwindows.
- variable contrast paper — printing paper in which the contrast of the image is controlled by the color of the printing light.
- velocity of circulation — the frequency with which a single unit of currency or the total money supply turns over within the economy in a given year.
- ventricular tachycardia — a cardiac arrhythmia in which the muscles of the ventricles contract irregularly in a rapid, uncoordinated manner, impairing the normal pumping of blood.
- verifiability principle — the doctrine that if a nonanalytic statement is to be cognitively meaningful it must be empirically verifiable.
- vestibulocochlear nerve — either one of the eight pairs of cranial nerves that supply the cochlea and semicircular canals of the internal ear and contribute to the sense of hearing
- video cassette recorder — See VCR.
- virtual device location — (Or "Virtual Address") The address of a device (e.g. disk, printer, terminal) belonging to a "guest" operating system. Such an address is mapped to a physical device. VM may remap several virtual disks to different parts of a single physical disk.
- viscount horatio nelson — Viscount Horatio, 1758–1805, British admiral.
- volumetric displacement — the volume of air per revolution that passes through a mechanical pump when the pressure at the intake and the exhaust is the same as that of the atmosphere
- voter registration card — a card that enables a person to register in order to vote
- water off a duck's back — any of numerous wild or domesticated web-footed swimming birds of the family Anatidae, especially of the genus Anas and allied genera, characterized by abroad, flat bill, short legs, and depressed body.
- weak inter-action force — a force between elementary particles that causes certain processes that take place with low probability, as radioactive beta-decay and collisions between neutrinos and other particles.
- what the doctor ordered — something needed or desired