20-letter words containing f, a
- college of cardinals — the collective body of cardinals having the function of electing and advising the pope
- college of education — a professional training college for teachers
- complete unification — (programming) W.P. Weijland's name for unification without occur check.
- confectioners' sugar — Confectioners' sugar is very fine white sugar that is used for making icing and candy.
- conformal projection — a map projection in which angles formed by lines are preserved: a map made using this projection preserves the shape of any small area.
- conservation of mass — the principle that the total mass of any isolated system is constant and is independent of any chemical and physical changes taking place within the system
- context of situation — the totality of extralinguistic features having relevance to a communicative act.
- context-free grammar — (grammar) (CFG) A grammar where the syntax of each constituent (syntactic category or terminal symbol) is independent of the symbols occuring before and after it in a sentence. A context-free grammar describes a context-free language. Context-free grammars can be expressed by a set of "production rules" or syntactic rules. For example, a language with symbols "a" and "b" that must occur in unequal numbers can be represented by the CFG: S → U | V U → TaU | TaT | UaT V → TbV | TbT | VbT T → aTbT | bTaT | ε meaning the top-level category "S" consists of either a "U" or a "V" and so on. The special category "ε" represents the empty string. This grammar is context-free because each rule has a single symbol on its left-hand side.
- correctional officer — a prison guard
- counter-inflationary — designed to reduce inflation
- counterproliferation — Action intended to prevent an increase or spread in the possession of nuclear weapons.
- court of last resort — (in the US) a supreme court
- court of st. james's — the British royal court: so called from St. James's Palace, London, the former scene of royal receptions.
- covenant of warranty — warranty (def 2b).
- covenant-of-warranty — warranty (def 2b).
- craft apprenticeship — a period of training for a skilled trade in industry, such as for a plumber or electrician
- cream of tomato soup — a creamy soup made from tomatoes
- curry favour with sb — If one person tries to curry favour with another, they do things in order to try to gain their support or co-operation.
- darkfield microscope — kind of microscope
- data dictionary file — (database) (DDF) A set of files describing the structure of a database file. DDFs define database tables and include information about file locations, field layouts and indexes. DDFs are the standard method for defining field and index characteristics for Btrieve files.
- de facto segregation — racial, ethnic, or other segregation resulting from societal differences between groups, as socioeconomic or political disparity, without institutionalized legislation intended to segregate.
- death of ivan ilyich — a short novel (1884) by Leo Tolstoy.
- decaffeinated coffee — Decaffeinated coffee is coffee that does not contain caffeine.
- defense data network — (DDN) A global communications network serving the US Department of Defense. Composed of MILNET, other portions of the Internet, and classified networks which are not part of the Internet. The DDN is used to connect military installations and is managed by the Defense Information Systems Agency.
- defined benefit plan — A defined benefit plan is a type of pension plan that guarantees a lifetime income upon retirement based on the employee’s income and years of service.
- department of energy — the department of the U.S. federal government that sets forth and maintains the national energy policy, including energy conservation, environmental protection, etc. Abbreviation: DOE.
- department of health — government ministry for health matters
- dichloroethyl formal — a colorless liquid, C 5 H 10 O 2 Cl 2 , used chiefly as a solvent and in the manufacture of certain synthetic rubbers.
- difference amplifier — A difference amplifier is a device that amplifies the difference between two inputs, rejecting any signals common to both.
- differential housing — the casing that houses the differential of a motor vehicle
- differential pricing — a situation in which different prices are charged for the same product or service
- dirac delta function — delta function.
- discounted cash flow — a technique for appraising an investment that takes into account the different values of future returns according to when they will be received
- district of columbia — a federal area in the E United States, on the Potomac, coextensive with the federal capital, Washington. 69 sq. mi. (179 sq. km). Abbreviation: DC (for use with zip code), D.C.
- double fertilization — the fertilization process characteristic of flowering plants, in which one sperm cell of a pollen grain fertilizes an egg cell while a second fuses with two polar nuclei to produce a triploid body that gives rise to the endosperm.
- due process (of law) — the course of legal proceedings established by the legal system of a nation or state to protect individual rights
- eat high off the hog — a hoofed mammal of the family Suidae, order Artiodactyla, comprising boars and swine.
- eat out of sb's hand — If you have someone eating out of your hand, they are completely under your control.
- ecological footprint — a mark left by the shod or unshod foot, as in earth or sand.
- edward the confessor — Saint, 1002?–66, English king 1042–66: founder of Westminster Abbey.
- effective computable — (theory) A term describing a function for which there is an effective algorithm that correctly calculates the function. The algorithm must consist of a finite sequence of instructions.
- effective resistance — the resistance to an alternating current, expressed as the ratio of the power dissipated to the square of the effective current.
- efficiency apartment — a small apartment consisting typically of a combined living room and bedroom area, a bathroom, and a kitchenette.
- eleanor of aquitaine — ?1122–1204, queen of France (1137–52) by her marriage to Louis VII and queen of England (1154–89) by her marriage to Henry II; mother of the English kings Richard I and John
- elizabeth of hungary — Saint. 1207–31, Hungarian princess who devoted herself to charity and asceticism. Feast day: Nov 17 and 19
- embryo vitrification — a method of in vitro fertilization in which the embryo is exposed to a vitreous solution and frozen before being thawed and implanted into the uterus
- entry qualifications — the qualifications people wishing to enter an organization, university, etc, have to have
- erythema infectiosum — a mild infectious disease of childhood, caused by a virus, characterized by fever and a red rash spreading from the cheeks to the limbs and trunk
- essential fatty acid — any fatty acid required by the body in manufacturing prostaglandins, found in such foods as oily fish and nuts
- european social fund — one of the four Structural Funds of the European Union which aims to support employment and the economic and social well-being of EU member countries