17-letter words containing d, e
- disruptive action — action performed by protestors, workers, etc that causes the disruption of a service
- dissociated press — [Play on "Associated Press"; perhaps inspired by a reference in the 1949 Bugs Bunny cartoon "What's Up, Doc?"] An algorithm for transforming any text into potentially humorous garbage even more efficiently than by passing it through a marketroid. The algorithm starts by printing any N consecutive words (or letters) in the text. Then at every step it searches for any random occurrence in the original text of the last N words (or letters) already printed and then prints the next word or letter. Emacs has a handy command for this. Here is a short example of word-based Dissociated Press applied to an earlier version of the Jargon File: wart: A small, crocky feature that sticks out of an array (C has no checks for this). This is relatively benign and easy to spot if the phrase is bent so as to be not worth paying attention to the medium in question. Here is a short example of letter-based Dissociated Press applied to the same source: window sysIWYG: A bit was named aften /bee't*/ prefer to use the other guy's re, especially in every cast a chuckle on neithout getting into useful informash speech makes removing a featuring a move or usage actual abstractionsidered interj. Indeed spectace logic or problem! A hackish idle pastime is to apply letter-based Dissociated Press to a random body of text and vgrep the output in hopes of finding an interesting new word. (In the preceding example, "window sysIWYG" and "informash" show some promise.) Iterated applications of Dissociated Press usually yield better results. Similar techniques called "travesty generators" have been employed with considerable satirical effect to the utterances of Usenet flamers; see pseudo.
- dissolve in tears — weep
- distance learning — education in which students receive instruction over the Internet, from a video, etc., instead of going to school.
- distance teaching — teaching via correspondence or the internet, where students are not physically present in a classroom
- distillers' grain — a by-product of the distillation process for making whisky, used as an animal foodstuff
- distributed force — A distributed force is a force that acts on a large part of a surface, not just on one place.
- distributed logic — a computer system in which remote terminals and electronic devices, distributed throughout the system, supplement the main computer by doing some of the computing or decision making
- distribution line — A distribution line is a line or system for distributing power from a transmission system to a consumer that operates at less than 69,000 volts.
- district attorney — an officer who acts as attorney for the people or government within a specified district.
- do one's business — an occupation, profession, or trade: His business is poultry farming.
- do the bidding of — to be obedient to; carry out the orders of
- dobell's solution — a clear, yellowish, aqueous solution of sodium borate, sodium bicarbonate, phenol, and glycerol, used chiefly as an antiseptic and astringent for the nose and throat.
- doberman pinscher — one of a German breed of medium-sized, short-haired dogs having a black, brown, or blue coat with rusty brown markings.
- document examiner — (hypertext, tool) A high-performance hypertext system by Symbolics that provides on-line access to their user documentation.
- dog in the manger — a person who selfishly keeps something that he or she does not really need or want so that others may not use or enjoy it.
- dollar a year man — of or being an official or employee, especially a federal appointee, who receives a token annual salary, usually of one dollar: a dollar-a-year man.
- dollars-and-cents — considered strictly in terms of money: from a dollars-and-cents viewpoint.
- domestic commerce — an interchange of goods or commodities, especially on a large scale between different countries (foreign commerce) or between different parts of the same country (domestic commerce) trade; business.
- domestic violence — physical abuse in the home
- dominant tenement — land in favor of which an easement or other servitude exists over another's land.
- doorstep salesman — a door-to-door salesman
- double gloucester — a type of smooth orange-red cheese of mild flavour
- double insulation — Double insulation is insulation that consists of both basic insulation and supplementary insulation.
- double pair royal — a set of four cards of the same denomination, worth 12 points.
- double quatrefoil — a charge having the form of a foil with eight leaves, used especially as the cadency mark of a ninth son.
- double refraction — the separation of a ray of light into two unequally refracted, plane-polarized rays of orthogonal polarizations, occurring in crystals in which the velocity of light rays is not the same in all directions.
- double track line — a railway line with double track
- double-ended bolt — a headless bolt threaded at both ends.
- douglas engelbart — (person) Douglas C. Engelbart, the inventor of the mouse. On 1968-12-09, Douglas C. Engelbart and the group of 17 researchers working with him in the Augmentation Research Center at Stanford Research Institute in Menlo Park, California, USA, presented a 90-minute live public demonstration of the on live system, NLS, they had been working on since 1962. The presentation was a session in the of the Fall Joint Computer Conference held at the Convention Center in San Francisco, and it was attended by about 1000 computer professionals. This was the public debut of the computer mouse, hypertext, object addressing, dynamic file linking and shared-screen collaboration involving two persons at different sites communicating over a network with audio and video interface. The original 90-minute video: Hyperlinks, Mouse, Web-board.
- dow jones average — The Dow Jones Average is a daily measurement of stock-exchange prices, based on the average price of a selected number of securities.
- down in the dumps — If you are down in the dumps, you are feeling very depressed and miserable.
- down the plughole — If you say that something has gone down the plughole, you mean that it has failed or has been lost or wasted.
- down-at-the-heels — of a shabby, run-down appearance; seedy: He is rapidly becoming a down-at-heel drifter and a drunk.
- down-in-the-mouth — glum
- downwardly mobile — See under vertical mobility (def 1).
- downwardly-mobile — See under vertical mobility (def 1).
- drained of colour — colourless
- dramatis personae — (used with a plural verb) the characters in a play.
- drawn-thread work — ornamental needlework done by drawing threads out of the fabric and using the remaining threads to form lacelike patterns
- dress-down friday — In some companies employees are allowed to wear clothes that are less smart than usual on a Friday. This day is known as a dress-down Friday.
- dressed up as sth — portrayed as
- drink like a fish — any of various cold-blooded, aquatic vertebrates, having gills, commonly fins, and typically an elongated body covered with scales.
- drink-drive limit — the maximum blood alcohol level permitted for someone driving a vehicle
- drive to the wall — to force into an awkward situation
- drive up the wall — to cause to become crazy or furious
- drive-by download — an incidence of an unwanted program being automatically downloaded to a computer, often without the user's knowledge
- drive-by shooting — an incident in which a person, building, or vehicle is shot at by someone in a moving vehicle
- droit du seigneur — the supposed right claimable by a feudal lord to have sexual relations with the bride of a vassal on her first night of marriage.
- drool-proof paper — (jargon) Documentation that has been obsessively dumbed down, to the point where only a cretin could bear to read it, is said to have succumbed to the "drool-proof paper syndrome" or to have been "written on drool-proof paper". For example, this is an actual quote from Apple Computer's LaserWriter manual: "Do not expose your LaserWriter to open fire or flame."