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17-letter words containing f, a, n, t, s

  • passenger traffic — number of passengers
  • phase of the moon — Used humorously as a random parameter on which something is said to depend. Sometimes implies unreliability of whatever is dependent, or that reliability seems to be dependent on conditions nobody has been able to determine. "This feature depends on having the channel open in mumble mode, having the foo switch set, and on the phase of the moon." See also heisenbug. True story: Once upon a time there was a bug that really did depend on the phase of the moon. There was a little subroutine that had traditionally been used in various programs at MIT to calculate an approximation to the moon's true phase. GLS incorporated this routine into a Lisp program that, when it wrote out a file, would print a timestamp line almost 80 characters long. Very occasionally the first line of the message would be too long and would overflow onto the next line, and when the file was later read back in the program would barf. The length of the first line depended on both the precise date and time and the length of the phase specification when the timestamp was printed, and so the bug literally depended on the phase of the moon! The first paper edition of the Jargon File (Steele-1983) included an example of one of the timestamp lines that exhibited this bug, but the typesetter "corrected" it. This has since been described as the phase-of-the-moon-bug bug.
  • play with oneself — a dramatic composition or piece; drama.
  • plug and feathers — an apparatus for splitting stone, consisting of two tapered bars (feathers) inserted into a hole drilled into the stone, between which a narrow wedge (plug) is hammered to spread them.
  • point of purchase — designating or in use at a retail outlet where an item can be purchased; point-of-sale: point-of-purchase displays to entice the buyer.
  • point-of-purchase — designating or in use at a retail outlet where an item can be purchased; point-of-sale: point-of-purchase displays to entice the buyer.
  • pre-manifestation — an act of manifesting.
  • pre-modifications — an act or instance of modifying.
  • preferential shop — a shop in which union members are preferred, usually by agreement of an employer with a union.
  • rotation of crops — a system of rotating in a fixed order the kinds of crops, as grain or grass, grown in the same field, to maintain soil fertility
  • safety in numbers — If you say that there is safety in numbers, you mean that you are safer doing something if there are a lot of people doing it rather than doing it alone.
  • safety inspection — an inspection of a place carried out to ensure that it is safe and not dangerous
  • safety precaution — a precaution that is taken in order to ensure that something is safe and not dangerous
  • saint elmo's fire — corona discharge.
  • san andreas fault — an active strike-slip fault in W United States, extending from San Francisco to S California and forming the on-land portion of the western margin of the North American Plate.
  • sanitary landfill — landfill.
  • sawed-off shotgun — rifle with a short barrel
  • scarlet firethorn — a Eurasian evergreen, thorny shrub, Pyracantha coccinea, of the rose family, having white, hairy flower clusters and bright red berries.
  • schiff-s--reagent — a solution of rosaniline and sulfurous acid in water, used to test for the presence of aldehydes.
  • scratch 'n' sniff — denoting a product that releases a smell when scratched
  • seat-of-the-pants — using or based on experience, instinct, or guesswork: a seat-of-the-pants management style.
  • self-administered — to manage (affairs, a government, etc.); have executive charge of: to administer the law.
  • self-annihilation — self-destruction; suicide.
  • self-appreciation — gratitude; thankful recognition: They showed their appreciation by giving him a gold watch.
  • self-commendation — the act of commending; recommendation; praise: commendation for a job well done.
  • self-condemnation — the act of condemning.
  • self-confirmation — the act of confirming.
  • self-consecration — the act of setting oneself to a task or vocation without ordination by others or by a religious body.
  • self-conservation — the act of conserving; prevention of injury, decay, waste, or loss; preservation: conservation of wildlife; conservation of human rights.
  • self-depreciating — self-deprecating.
  • self-dissociation — an act or instance of dissociating.
  • self-emancipation — the act of emancipating.
  • self-entertaining — affording entertainment; amusing; diverting: We spent an entertaining evening at the theater.
  • self-estrangement — to turn away in feeling or affection; make unfriendly or hostile; alienate the affections of: Their quarrel estranged the two friends.
  • self-flagellation — the act or process of flagellating.
  • self-impregnating — to make pregnant; get with child or young.
  • self-incompatible — not capable of self-pollination.
  • self-perpetuating — continuing oneself in office, rank, etc., beyond the normal limit.
  • self-presentation — an act of presenting.
  • self-preservation — preservation of oneself from harm or destruction.
  • self-purification — a natural process of purifying, as the ability of a body of water to rid itself of pollutants.
  • self-renunciation — renunciation of one's own will, interests, etc.
  • self-satisfaction — a usually smug satisfaction with oneself, one's achievements, etc.
  • semi-manufactured — the making of goods or wares by manual labor or by machinery, especially on a large scale: the manufacture of television sets.
  • sentence fragment — a phrase or clause written as a sentence but lacking an element, as a subject or verb, that would enable it to function as an independent sentence in normative written English.
  • separating funnel — a large funnel having a tap in its output tube, used to separate immiscible liquids
  • set one's cap for — a close-fitting covering for the head, usually of soft supple material and having no visor or brim.
  • significance test — (in hypothesis testing) a test of whether the alternative hypothesis achieves the predetermined significance level in order to be accepted in preference to the null hypothesis
  • significant other — Sociology. a person, as a parent or peer, who has great influence on one's behavior and self-esteem.
  • silk manufacturer — a person or business that is involved in the manufacture of silk thread and fabric
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