17-letter words containing d, u, a
- chadless keypunch — (hardware) A card punch which cut little U-shapes in punched cards, rather than punching out a circle or rectangle. The U's made a hole when folded back. One of the Jargon File's correspondents believed that the term "chad" derived from the Chadless keypunch. Obviously, if the Chadless keypunch didn't make them, then the stuff that other keypunches made had to be "chad". The assertion that the keypunch was named after its inventor is not supported by any record in US or UK patents or surname references.
- charles de gaulle — Charles André Joseph Marie [chahrlz ahn-drey joh-zuh f muh-ree;; French sharl ahn-drey zhoh-zef ma-ree] /tʃɑrlz ˈɑn dreɪ ˈdʒoʊ zəf məˈri;; French ʃarl ɑ̃ˈdreɪ ʒoʊˈzɛf maˈri/ (Show IPA), 1890–1970, French general and statesman: president 1959–69.
- chateau cardboard — wine sold in a winebox
- christmas pudding — Christmas pudding is a special pudding that is eaten at Christmas.
- church of england — The Church of England is the main church in England. It has the Queen as its head and it does not recognize the authority of the Pope.
- churchyard beetle — a blackish nocturnal ground beetle, Blaps mucronata, found in cellars and similar places
- ciudad del carmen — a city in SE Mexico, on the Gulf of Campeche.
- cloud cuckoo land — an idealized, illusory domain of imagination; cloudland: the cloud-cuckoo-land of technicolor cartoon whimsy.
- cloud-cuckoo-land — If you say that someone is living in cloud-cuckoo-land, you are criticizing them because they think there are no problems and that things will happen exactly as they want them to, when this is obviously not the case.
- coastguard vessel — a ship used by the coastguard
- code of behaviour — the generally accepted rules governing how people behave
- code of hammurabi — a Babylonian legal code of the 18th century b.c. or earlier, instituted by Hammurabi and dealing with criminal and civil matters.
- coldstream guards — a guard regiment of the English royal household: formed in Coldstream, Scotland, 1659–60, and instrumental in restoring the English monarchy under Charles II.
- compound fraction — complex fraction
- compound fracture — A compound fracture is a fracture in which the broken bone sticks through the skin.
- compound interval — an interval that is greater than an octave, as a ninth or a thirteenth.
- consolidated fund — a fund into which tax revenue is paid in order to meet standing charges, esp interest payments on the national debt
- consumer advocate — consumerist (def 1).
- consumer watchdog — an organization or government agency that campaigns for consumers
- consumer-advocate — Also called consumer advocate. a person who is dedicated to protecting and promoting the welfare and rights of consumers.
- contradistinguish — to differentiate by means of contrasting or opposing qualities
- coordinate clause — one of two or more clauses in a sentence having the same status and introduced by coordinating conjunctions
- count one's beads — to pray with a rosary
- counterpropaganda — propaganda to offset or nullify unfriendly or enemy propaganda.
- courtship display — behaviour that is aimed at attracting a mate
- credit memorandum — a memorandum issued to an account allowing a credit or reducing a debit, especially one posted to a customer's account.
- crude oil cracker — A crude oil cracker is the part of a refinery and the equipment used for changing crude oil to its fractions, using heat and pressure.
- culpable homicide — manslaughter
- cushing's disease — a rare condition caused by excess corticosteroid hormones in the body, characterized chiefly by obesity of the trunk and face, high blood pressure, fatigue, and loss of calcium from the bones
- cut a good figure — to appear or behave well
- cut a person dead — to ignore a person completely
- d&o insurance — D&O insurance is a personal liability insurance that provides cover to the directors and senior executives of a company.
- dagestan republic — a constituent republic of S Russia, on the Caspian Sea: annexed from Persia in 1813; rich mineral resources. Capital: Makhachkala. Pop: 2 584 200 (2002). Area: 50 278 sq km (19 416 sq miles)
- damp-proof course — A damp-proof course is the same as a damp course.
- dangerous driving — the act of driving a motor vehicle in a manner that falls far below that expected of a competent and careful driver and hence puts the life of the driver and the lives of other road users at risk
- data service unit — (communications) (DSU or "data service unit") A device used in digital transmission for connecting a CSU (Channel Service Unit) to Data Terminal Equipment (a terminal or computer), in the same way that a modem is used for connection to an analogue medium. A DSU provides a standard interface to a user's terminal which is compatible with modems and handles such functions as signal translation, regeneration, reformatting, and timing. The transmitting portion of the DSU processeses the customers' signal into bipolar pulses suitable for transmission over the digital facility. The receiving portion of the DSU is used both to extract timing information and to regenerate mark and space information from the received bipolar signal.
- daughter language — a language that has evolved from another specified language.
- decellularization — (biology, medicine) The loss of cells from tissue.
- decontextualizing — to remove (a linguistic element, an action, etc.) from a context: decontextualized works of art displayed in museums.
- deductible clause — a clause in an insurance policy stipulating that the insured will be liable for a specified initial amount of each loss, injury, etc., and that the insurance company will be liable for any additional costs up to the insured amount.
- deductive tableau — (tool) A theorem proof system consisting of a table whose rows contain assertions or goals. Variables in assertions are implicitly universally quantified and variables in goals are implicitly existentially quantified. The declarative meaning of a tableau is that if every instance of every assertion is true then some instance of at least one of the goals is true.
- deindustrializing — Present participle of deindustrialize.
- delay instruction — delayed control-transfer
- denatured alcohol — ethanol rendered unfit for human consumption by the addition of a noxious substance, as in methylated spirits
- denominate number — a number associated with a unit of measurement.
- deoxyribonuclease — DNase.
- desaix de veygoux — Louis Charles Antoine [lwee sharl ahn-twan] /lwi ʃærl ɑ̃ˈtwan/ (Show IPA), 1768–1800, French general.
- deucalion's flood — a flood sent by Zeus that wiped out the entire population of the earth, except for Deucalion and his wife Pyrrha
- diabetes mellitus — a disorder of carbohydrate metabolism characterized by excessive thirst and excretion of abnormally large quantities of urine containing an excess of sugar, caused by a deficiency of insulin
- diaphragm shutter — a camera shutter having a group of overlapping blades that open and close at the center when exposing film.