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17-letter words containing e, f, r

  • contraflow system — a system of traffic lanes whose normal direction is reversed to allow traffic to move during repairs or an accident
  • copious free time — (jargon)   (Apple; originally from the introduction to Tom Lehrer's song "It Makes A Fellow Proud To Be A Soldier") Used ironically to indicate the speaker's lack of the quantity in question; a mythical schedule slot for accomplishing tasks held to be unlikely or impossible. Sometimes used to indicate that the speaker is interested in accomplishing the task, but believes that the opportunity will not arise. "I'll implement the automatic layout stuff in my copious free time." The phrase is also used for time reserved for bogus or otherwise idiotic tasks, such as implementation of bad chrome, or the stroking of suits. "I'll get back to him on that feature in my copious free time."
  • corporal of horse — a noncommissioned rank in the British Household Cavalry above that of sergeant and below that of staff sergeant
  • council of europe — an association of European states, established in 1949 to promote unity between its members, defend human rights, and increase social and economic progress
  • counter-influence — the capacity or power of persons or things to be a compelling force on or produce effects on the actions, behavior, opinions, etc., of others: He used family influence to get the contract.
  • counteroffensives — Plural form of counteroffensive.
  • court of chancery — (in the US) a court of equity
  • court of sessions — any of state courts of criminal jurisdiction in California, New York, and a few other states.
  • court-of-chancery — chancery (def 4a).
  • cream of the crop — the best of a group
  • creature comforts — Creature comforts are the things that you need to feel comfortable in a place, for example good food and modern equipment.
  • creature of habit — If you say that someone is a creature of habit, you mean that they usually do the same thing at the same time each day, rather than doing new and different things.
  • credit facilities — a type of loan made by a bank
  • cross of lorraine — a cross with two horizontal bars above and below the midpoint of the vertical bar, the lower longer than the upper
  • culture diffusion — the spreading out of culture, culture traits, or a cultural pattern from a central point.
  • culture-fair test — a test, usually for intelligence, that does not put anyone taking it at a disadvantage, esp regarding material or cultural background
  • culture-free test — a test (usually for intelligence) that does not put anyone taking it at a disadvantage, for instance, as regards material or cultural background
  • cut a good figure — to appear or behave well
  • cut a poor figure — to appear or behave badly
  • damp-proof course — A damp-proof course is the same as a damp course.
  • darwinian fitness — fitness (def 3).
  • darwinian-fitness — health.
  • david copperfield — a novel (1850) by Charles Dickens.
  • de facto standard — A widespread consensus on a particular product or protocol which has not been ratified by any official standards body, such as ISO, but which nevertheless has a large market share. The archetypal example of a de facto standard is the IBM PC which, despite is many glaring technical deficiencies, has gained such a large share of the personal computer market that it is now popular simply because it is popular and therefore enjoys fierce competition in pricing and software development.
  • death certificate — A death certificate is an official certificate signed by a doctor which states the cause of a person's death.
  • dedifferentiating — Present participle of dedifferentiate.
  • dedifferentiation — the reversion of the cells of differentiated tissue to a less specialized form
  • deep-frozen foods — foodstuffs that have been frozen for storage
  • defamiliarisation — (arts) The representation of objects anew, in a way that we do not recognize, or that changes our reading of them.
  • defamiliarization — Art, Literature. a theory and technique, originating in the early 20th century, in which an artistic or literary work presents familiar objects or situations in an unfamiliar way, prolonging the perceptive process and allowing for a fresh perspective.
  • defence secretary — the member of a government who is responsible for the country's armed forces
  • deferred sentence — a sentence that is postponed for a specific period to allow a court to examine the conduct of the offender during the deferment
  • definite integral — the evaluation of the indefinite integral between two limits, representing the area between the given function and the x-axis between these two values of x
  • degree of freedom — one of the minimum number of parameters necessary to describe a state or property of a system
  • denial of service — a deliberate interruption in access to a computer system or network, esp by using multiple computers to generate an unmanageable volume of traffic (distributed denial of service)
  • denial-of-service — pertaining to or being an incident in which a computer or computer network is disabled, disrupting access or service: a website hit by a denial-of-service attack; unintentional denial-of-service problems.
  • deprofessionalise — to remove from professional control, influence, manipulation, etc.
  • deprofessionalize — to remove from professional control, influence, manipulation, etc.
  • difference engine — (computer, history)   Charles Babbage's design for the first automatic mechanical calculator. The Difference Engine was a special purpose device intended for the production of mathematical tables. Babbage started work on the Difference Engine in 1823 with funding from the British Government. Only one-seventh of the complete engine, about 2000 parts, was built in 1832 by Babbage's engineer, Joseph Clement. This was demonstrated successfully by Babbage and still works perfectly. The engine was never completed and most of the 12,000 parts manufactured were later melted for scrap. It was left to Georg and Edvard Schuetz to construct the first working devices to the same design which were successful in limited applications. The Difference Engine No. 2 was finally completed in 1991 at the Science Museum, London, UK and is on display there. The engine used gears to compute cumulative sums in a series of registers: r[i] := r[i] + r[i+1]. However, the addition had the side effect of zeroing r[i+1]. Babbage overcame this by simultaneously copying r[i+1] to a temporary register during the addition and then copying it back to r[i+1] at the end of each cycle (each turn of a handle).
  • differentiability — The ability to be differentiated.
  • differential gear — differential (def 7).
  • differential line — (hardware)   A kind of electrical connection using two wires, one of which carries the normal signal (V) and the other carries an inverted version the signal (-V). A differential amplifier at the receiver subtracts the inverted signal from the normal signal to yield a signal proportional to V. This subtraction is intended to cancel out any noise induced in the wires, on the assmption that the same level of noise will have been induced in both wires. Twisted pair wiring is often used to try to ensure that this is the case. The two wires might be connected at the receiver to separate analogue to digital converters and the subtraction performed digitally. The RS-422 serial line standard specifies differential drivers and receivers, whereas the earlier RS-232 standard does not. Opposite: single ended.
  • differential rate — a special lower rate, as one charged by one of two or more competing businesses.
  • differential tone — a musical sound sometimes heard when two loud notes are sounded together, lower in pitch than either
  • dimethylformamide — a colourless liquid widely used as a solvent and sometimes as a catalyst. Formula: (CH3)2NCHO
  • director of music — a person in charge of musical training and performance at an institution such as a college, especially the head bandmaster of a military band
  • disrespectfulness — The state or quality of being disrespectful; disrespect; disregard.
  • distributed force — A distributed force is a force that acts on a large part of a surface, not just on one place.
  • 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.
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