0%

13-letter words containing f, e, c, o

  • false economy — an attempt to save money which actually leads to greater expense
  • fat electrons — (electronics, humour)   Old-time hacker David Cargill's theory on the cause of computer glitches. Your typical electricity company draws its line current out of the big generators with a pair of coil taps located near the top of the dynamo. When the normal tap brushes get dirty, they take them off line to clean them up, and use special auxiliary taps on the *bottom* of the coil. Now, this is a problem, because when they do that they get not ordinary or "thin" electrons, but the fat sloppy electrons that are heavier and so settle to the bottom of the generator. These flow down ordinary wires just fine, but when they have to turn a sharp corner (as in an integrated-circuit via), they're apt to get stuck. This is what causes computer glitches. Compare bogon, magic smoke.
  • feature shock — (jargon)   (From Alvin Toffler's "Future Shock") A user's confusion when confronted with a package that has too many features and poor introductory material.
  • federal court — a court of a federal government, especially one established under the Constitution of the United States.
  • feedback form — A feedback form is a paper with questions on it and spaces marked where you should write the answers. It asks a hotel guest if they enjoyed their stay and what could be improved.
  • feedback loop — the path by which some of the output of a circuit, system, or device is returned to the input.
  • feeder school — a junior school whose pupils go to a specific secondary school
  • felicitations — an expression of good wishes; congratulation.
  • female condom — a type of condom used by women and inserted into the vagina
  • ferociousness — savagely fierce, as a wild beast, person, action, or aspect; violently cruel: a ferocious beating.
  • ferricyanogen — (chemistry) A hexavalent radical, Fe2(CN)12, a compound of cyanogen and iron in the ferric state.
  • ferrochromium — a ferroalloy containing up to 70 percent chromium.
  • ferroconcrete — reinforced concrete.
  • ferrocyanogen — a ferrocyanide radical
  • ferroelectric — pertaining to a substance that possesses spontaneous electric polarization such that the polarization can be reversed by an electric field.
  • ferromagnetic — noting or pertaining to a substance, as iron, that below a certain temperature, the Curie point, can possess magnetization in the absence of an external magnetic field; noting or pertaining to a substance in which the magnetic moments of the atoms are aligned.
  • ferrosoferric — containing both a ferrous compound and a ferric compound
  • ferry company — a company that operates a ferry or ferries
  • fictionalised — Simple past tense and past participle of fictionalise.
  • fictionalized — to make into fiction; give a somewhat imaginative or fictional version of: to fictionalize a biography.
  • fictionalizes — Third-person singular simple present indicative form of fictionalize.
  • field officer — an officer holding a field grade.
  • film recorder — a photographic device for producing a sound strip on a motion-picture film.
  • filter coffee — coffee made by filtering hot water through ground coffee
  • filter factor — a number indicating the increased exposure that a particular film should receive when a photograph is taken using a particular filter.
  • firewall code — 1. The code you put in a system (say, a telephone switch) to make sure that the users can't do any damage. Since users always want to be able to do everything but never want to suffer for any mistakes, the construction of a firewall is a question not only of defensive coding but also of interface presentation, so that users don't even get curious about those corners of a system where they can burn themselves. 2. Any sanity check inserted to catch a can't happen error. Wise programmers often change code to fix a bug twice: once to fix the bug, and once to insert a firewall which would have arrested the bug before it did quite as much damage.
  • first officer — first mate.
  • flag of truce — a white flag displayed as an invitation to the enemy to confer, or carried as a sign of peaceful intention by one sent to deal with the enemy.
  • flesh-colored — Something that is flesh-colored is yellowish pink in color.
  • float chamber — Automotive. the bowl-shaped section of a carburetor in which a reserve of fuel is maintained, the fuel level being regulated by a float.
  • floatcut file — file with rows of parallel teeth
  • floor furnace — a small self-contained furnace placed just below the floor of the space to be heated.
  • floorcovering — A covering for a floor.
  • flow cleavage — cleavage resulting from the parallel alignment of the mineral constituents of a rock when in a plastic condition.
  • flower-pecker — any of numerous small, arboreal, usually brightly colored oscine birds of the family Dicaeidae, of southeastern Asia and Australia.
  • fluorescently — In a fluorescent manner; using fluorescence.
  • fluoroacetate — a toxic chemical compound, C2H2FNaO2, occurring naturally in certain plants, and commonly used as rat poison
  • fluorochromes — Plural form of fluorochrome.
  • focal seizure — an epileptic manifestation arising from a localized anomaly in the brain, as a small tumor or scar, and usually involving a single motor or sensory mechanism but occasionally spreading to other areas and causing convulsions and loss of consciousness.
  • foldoc source — The source text of FOLDOC is a single plain text file. FOLDOC is also available on paper from your local printer but, at 700,000+ words, that would be about 2000 pages.
  • folk medicine — health practices arising from superstition, cultural traditions, or empirical use of native remedies, especially food substances.
  • follicle mite — any mite of the family Demodicidae, parasitic in hair follicles of various mammals, including humans.
  • fonctionnaire — a civil servant
  • food security — an economic and social condition of ready access by all members of a household to nutritionally adequate and safe food: a household with high food security.
  • footing piece — one of a series of horizontal transverse timbers supporting a platform or staging.
  • for chrissake — for Christ's sake
  • for-instances — an instance or example: Give me a for-instance of what you mean.
  • force a smile — to make oneself smile
  • force majeure — an unexpected and disruptive event that may operate to excuse a party from a contract.
  • forced labour — labour done because of force; compulsory labour
Was this page helpful?
Yes No
Thank you for your feedback! Tell your friends about this page
Tell us why?