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14-letter words containing e, r, y, m

  • scratch monkey — (humour)   As in "Before testing or reconfiguring, always mount a scratch monkey", a proverb used to advise caution when dealing with irreplaceable data or devices. Used to refer to any scratch volume hooked to a computer during any risky operation as a replacement for some precious resource or data that might otherwise get trashed. This term preserves the memory of Mabel, the Swimming Wonder Monkey, star of a biological research program at the University of Toronto. Mabel was not (so the legend goes) your ordinary monkey; the university had spent years teaching her how to swim, breathing through a regulator, in order to study the effects of different gas mixtures on her physiology. Mabel suffered an untimely demise one day when a DEC engineer troubleshooting a crash on the program's VAX inadvertently interfered with some custom hardware that was wired to Mabel. It is reported that, after calming down an understandably irate customer sufficiently to ascertain the facts of the matter, a DEC troubleshooter called up the field circus manager responsible and asked him sweetly, "Can you swim?" Not all the consequences to humans were so amusing; the sysop of the machine in question was nearly thrown in jail at the behest of certain clueless droids at the local "humane" society. The moral is clear: When in doubt, always mount a scratch monkey. A corespondent adds: The details you give are somewhat consistent with the version I recall from the Digital "War Stories" notesfile, but the name "Mabel" and the swimming bit were not mentioned, IIRC. Also, there's a very detailed account that claims that three monkies died in the incident, not just one. I believe Eric Postpischil wrote the original story at DEC, so his coming back with a different version leads me to wonder whether there ever was a real Scratch Monkey incident.
  • secondary beam — a beam of particles of one kind selected from the group of particles produced when a beam of particles from an accelerator (primary beam) strikes a target.
  • seismic survey — A seismic survey is a method of investigating underground properties and rock patterns using induced shock wave reflections.
  • semi-legendary — somewhat legendary; having something of the nature of a legend; almost legendary
  • semi-paralysis — Pathology. a loss or impairment of voluntary movement in a body part, caused by injury or disease of the nerves, brain, or spinal cord. a disease characterized by this, especially palsy.
  • semi-paralyzed — to affect with paralysis.
  • sequestrectomy — the removal of dead spicules or portions, especially of bone.
  • shirley temple — Shirley (Shirley Temple Black) 1928–2014, U.S. film actress, famous for child roles during the 1930s, and diplomat.
  • skew-symmetric — noting a square matrix that is equal to the negative of its transpose.
  • solid geometry — the geometry of solid figures; geometry of three dimensions.
  • southern yemen — a former name of Yemen (def 1).
  • st. marylebone — former metropolitan borough of London: since 1965, part of Westminster
  • standard money — money made of a metal that has utility and value apart from its use as a unit of monetary exchange.
  • start-up money — money that is spent on setting up a new business or other project
  • summer cypress — burning bush (def 2).
  • supereminently — in a supereminent manner; to a supereminent degree
  • supersymmetric — pertaining to supersymmetry
  • support system — people who provide support: a family support system to help a troubled youth.
  • surinam cherry — a tropical American tree, Eugenia uniflora, of the myrtle family, having ovate leaves and fragrant, white flowers.
  • sycamore maple — a maple, Acer pseudoplatanus, of Europe and western Asia, having gray bark and opposite, lobed leaves: grown as a shade tree.
  • symmetric lisp — A parallel Lisp in which environments are first-class objects. It is implemented in Common LISP. E-mail: Suresh Jagannathan <[email protected]>.
  • symmetrophobia — an avoidance of symmetry, esp in Japanese art and Egyptian temples
  • symmetry plane — reflection plane.
  • syrian hamster — golden hamster.
  • system program — a program, as an operating system, compiler, or utility program, that controls some aspect of the operation of a computer (opposed to application program).
  • systems theory — an approach to industrial relations which likens the enterprise to an organism with interdependent parts, each with its own specific function and interrelated responsibilities
  • take away from — detract
  • temporary duty — duty of limited duration performed with an organization other than the one to which a person is normally attached or assigned. Abbreviation: TDY.
  • testamentarily — in a testamentary manner
  • the real mccoy — the genuine thing or person as promised, stated, or implied (usually preceded by the or the real): Those other paintings are copies, but this one is the McCoy.
  • the royal mail — the national postal service of the United Kingdom
  • theory of mind — Psychology, Philosophy. the ability to interpret one’s own and other people’s mental and emotional states, understanding that each person has unique motives, perspectives, etc.: People with autism seem to lack theory of mind. Abbreviation: ToM, TOM.
  • thermoanalysis — thermal analysis.
  • thermodynamics — the science concerned with the relations between heat and mechanical energy or work, and the conversion of one into the other: modern thermodynamics deals with the properties of systems for the description of which temperature is a necessary coordinate.
  • thermolability — the state of being unstable or subject to transformation or destruction when heated
  • thermophyllous — relating to deciduous plants or trees that bear leaves only during the warmer times of the year
  • thomas younger — Thomas Coleman ("Cole") 1844–1916, U.S. outlaw, associated with Jesse James.
  • torrens system — (in Australia, England, Canada, certain states of the U.S., etc.) a system of registration of land titles in which the titles are settled consequent to establishment and validation by a legal proceeding, designed chiefly to make title insurance unnecessary and to facilitate transfers.
  • trachyspermous — having seeds with a rough coat.
  • transit system — public transport service
  • trimethylamine — a colourless, flammable liquid with a strong, fishy odour
  • triphenylamine — a molecule consisting of a nitrogen atom with three phenyl groups attached to it
  • trumpet player — a person who plays the trumpet
  • tumorigenicity — (of cells or a substance) capable of producing tumors.
  • tunny emulator — (hardware, cryptography)   A special-purpose computer designed at Bletchley Park (UK) based upon the reverse engineering of the Lorenz Cypher. The Lorenz Cypher was used by the German army to encrypt high command orders for transmission via teleprinter (the Enigma was a field-use cypher). Once the key to a message was discovered (by the computer Colossus) the Tunny machine would be set to decrypt the message. The process took about four days from intercept to printout. The original Tunny machine was built about 1943 and scrapped after the war. In 2011 a working model was re-built at Bletchley Park where it is on display.
  • turbomachinery — machinery consisting of, incorporating, or constituting a turbine
  • turnkey system — Computers. a computer system purchased from hardware and software vendors, customized and put in working order by a firm that then sells the completed system to the client that ordered it.
  • tymshare, inc. — (company)   The US company that created the TYMNET network.
  • ubv photometry — the photometric measurement of the color index of a star, using ultraviolet, blue, and visual (yellow) filters.
  • uncontemporary — outmoded
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