21-letter words containing d, a, i, b
- faisal ibn abdul aziz — 1905–75, king of Saudi Arabia (1964–75)
- forward compatibility — (jargon) The ability to accept input from later versions of itself. Forward compatibility is harder to achieve than backward compatibility, since, in the backward case, the input format is know whereas a forward compatible system needs to cope gracefully with unknown future features. An example of future compatibility is the stipulation that a web browser should ignore HTML tags it does not recognise. See also extensible.
- garbageabetical order — (humour) 1. The result of using an insertion sort to merge data into an unsorted list. 2. The state of any file or list that is supposed to be sorted, but is not.
- gaussian distribution — normal distribution
- give sb the runaround — If someone gives you the runaround, they deliberately do not give you all the information or help that you want, and send you to another person or place to get it.
- gold bullion standard — a gold standard in which gold is not coined but may be purchased at a fixed price for foreign exchange.
- hierarchical database — (database) A kind of database management system that links records together like a family tree such that each record type has only one owner, e.g. an order is owned by only one customer. Hierarchical structures were widely used in the first mainframe database management systems. However, due to their restrictions, they often cannot be used to relate structures that exist in the real world.
- hildegard (of bingen) — Saint(1098-1179); Ger. nun, composer, & mystic: her day is Sept. 17
- hindu-arabic numerals — Arabic numeral.
- hyperbolic paraboloid — a paraboloid that can be put into a position such that its sections parallel to one coordinate plane are hyperbolas, with its sections parallel to the other two coordinate planes being parabolas.
- in bad/good/etc taste — If you say that something that is said or done is in bad taste or in poor taste, you mean that it is offensive, often because it concerns death or sex and is inappropriate for the situation. If you say that something is in good taste, you mean that it is not offensive and that it is appropriate for the situation.
- international brigade — a military force that fought on the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War, consisting of volunteers (predominantly socialists and communists) from many countries
- just a bunch of disks — (jargon, storage) (JBOD, or "Just a Bunch of Drives") A storage subsystems using multiple independent disk drives, as opposed to one form of RAID or another. For example, Unisys open storage provides JBOD in both SCSI and fibre channel interfaces.
- keyboard send receive — (hardware) (KSR) Part of a designation for a hard-copy terminal, manufactured by Teletype Corporation. The KSR range were lower cost versions of the ASR models.
- khalid ibn abdul aziz — 1913–82, king and President of the Council of Ministers of Saudi Arabia (1975–82)
- lady murasaki shikibu — Lady, 978?–1031? Japanese poet and novelist.
- lambeth quadrilateral — the four essentials agreed upon at the Lambeth Conference of 1888 for a United Christian Church, namely, the Holy Scriptures, the Apostles' Creed, the sacraments of baptism and Holy Communion, and the historic episcopate
- language-based editor — language-sensitive editor
- lap and diagonal belt — A lap and diagonal belt is a strap attached to a seat in a vehicle that extends horizontally in front of the hips and diagonally from the outer shoulder across the chest. You fasten it across your body in order to prevent yourself being thrown out of the seat if there is a sudden movement or stop.
- leave holding the bag — a container or receptacle of leather, plastic, cloth, paper, etc., capable of being closed at the mouth; pouch.
- like a blue-arsed fly — in a state of frenzied activity
- luck was on sb's side — If you say that luck was on someone's side, you mean that they succeeded in something by chance as well as by their own efforts or ability.
- magnificent riflebird — a bird of paradise, Craspedophora magnifica
- maître d'hôtel butter — melted butter mixed with parsley and lemon juice
- make one's blood boil — the fluid that circulates in the principal vascular system of human beings and other vertebrates, in humans consisting of plasma in which the red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets are suspended.
- maple-leaved viburnum — dockmackie.
- mayor of casterbridge — a novel (1886) by Thomas Hardy.
- national public radio — a nationwide network of nonprofit radio stations supported in part by U.S. government funds distributed by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, often affiliated with a public television station or educational institution. Abbreviation: NPR.
- nine-banded armadillo — an armadillo, Dasypus novemcinctus, of the southern U.S. to Argentina, having nine hinged bands of bony plates, the female of which usually gives birth to quadruplets that are always of the same sex.
- northumberland strait — the part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence that separates Prince Edward Island from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, in SE Canada. About 200 miles (320 km) long; 9–30 miles (15–48 km) wide.
- optical double (star) — double star (sense 2)
- past its sell-by date — the last date on which perishable food should be sold, usually established with some allowance for home storage under refrigeration. Compare shelf life.
- pipelined burst cache — Pipeline Burst Cache
- premium savings bonds — (in Britain) bonds issued by the Treasury since 1956 for purchase by the public. No interest is paid but there is a monthly draw for cash prizes of various sums
- printed circuit board — a circuit in which the interconnecting conductors and some of the circuit components have been printed, etched, etc., onto a sheet or board of dielectric material (PC board, printed-circuit board)
- propantheline bromide — a substance, C 2 3 H 3 0 BrNO 3 , used in the treatment of peptic ulcers.
- public address system — loudspeaker
- public administration — the implementation of public policy, largely by the executive branch.
- public-address system — a combination of electronic devices that makes sound audible via loudspeakers to many people, as in an auditorium or out of doors.
- rayleigh distribution — (mathematics) A curve that yields a good approximation to the actual labour curves on software projects.
- roodepoort-maraisburg — a city in S Transvaal, in the NE Republic of South Africa.
- sampling distribution — the distribution of a statistic based on all possible random samples that can be drawn from a given population.
- santa barbara islands — group of nine islands, & many islets, off the SW coast of Calif.
- sealed-beam headlight — a headlight in which the reflector and lens are hermetically sealed together with the filament in a single unit.
- sense and sensibility — a novel (1811) by Jane Austen.
- serbia and montenegro — a former country in SE Europe, consisting of the republics of Serbia and Montenegro; replaced the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 2003, and dissolved in 2006 following Montenegro’s decision to secede
- snr bandwidth product — (communications) The integral of the SNR over frequency. The SNR bandwidth product is an important limit in the capacity of a communication channel.
- sodium metabisulphite — an inorganic compound with the chemical formula Na2S2O5 that is used as a preservative, antioxidant and disinfectant
- submerged arc welding — a type of heavy electric-arc welding using mechanically fed bare wire with the arc submerged in powdered flux to keep out oxygen
- take sb at their word — If you take someone at their word, you believe what they say, when they did not really mean it or when they meant something slightly different.