17-letter words containing f, e, m
- mother of vinegar — mother2 .
- motion of censure — a motion by opposition parties criticizing the government
- mount fairweather — a mountain in W North America, on the border between Alaska and British Columbia. Height: 4663 m (15 300 ft)
- multiplier effect — the effect of government spending on national income
- neurofibromatosis — a dominantly inherited genetic disorder characterized by flat brown patches on the skin, neurofibromas of the skin and internal organs, and in some cases skeletal deformity.
- newfoundland time — a form of civil time observed on the island of Newfoundland, one and one-half hours later than Eastern time and a half hour later than Atlantic time.
- nightshade family — the plant family Solanaceae, characterized by herbaceous plants, trees, shrubs, and vines having alternate, simple or pinnate leaves, conspicuous flowers, and fruit in the form of a berry or capsule, and including belladonna, eggplant, nightshade, peppers of the genus Capsicum, petunia, potato, tobacco, and tomato.
- non-reinforcement — the act of reinforcing.
- noninertial frame — a frame of reference that moves with the object, so that the moving object appears to violate Newton's laws of motion since it accelerates despite having no horizontal forces on it.
- noun pre-modifier — a noun that occurs before and modifies another noun, as toy in toy store or tour in tour group.
- office automation — a method or system of using automated or electronic equipment, as word processors and computers, in the operations of an office.
- office by example — (language) (OBE) A sequel to QBE, described in publications by Moshe Zloof of IBM in the early 1980s but apparently never implemented.
- old norman french — Norman French (sense 1)
- on the home front — domestically
- one-parent family — A one-parent family is a family that consists of one parent and his or her children living together.
- organized ferment — ferment (def 1).
- out of one's mind — (in a human or other conscious being) the element, part, substance, or process that reasons, thinks, feels, wills, perceives, judges, etc.: the processes of the human mind.
- overhead camshaft — a camshaft in an automotive engine that is located in the cylinder head over the engine block rather than in the block. Abbreviation: OHC.
- pair of compasses — compass (def 7)
- palette of narmer — a king of Egypt identified by modern scholars as the Menes of tradition and depicted as the unifier of Upper and Lower Egypt on an ancient slate tablet (Narmer Palette or Palette of Narmer) c3200 b.c. with relief carvings on both sides.
- peer of the realm — any of a class of peers in Great Britain and Ireland entitled by heredity to sit in the House of Lords.
- performance bonus — a monetary bonus paid to staff who have performed well in their job
- performance drugs — the drugs that are taken illegally by athletes to enhance their sporting performance
- 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.
- phenylformic acid — benzoic acid.
- phlebotomus fever — sandfly fever.
- plumbing fixtures — things such as pipes, sinks, toilets that are fixed in position in a building
- portfolio manager — a person employed by others to make investments for them
- potassium sulfate — a crystalline, water-soluble solid, K 2 SO 4 , used chiefly in the manufacture of fertilizers, alums, and mineral water, and as a reagent in analytical chemistry.
- pre-manifestation — an act of manifesting.
- pre-modifications — an act or instance of modifying.
- pro forma invoice — an invoice issued before an order is placed or before the goods are delivered giving all the details and the cost of the goods
- professional army — an army of trained soldiers
- profile component — attainment targets in different subjects brought together for the general assessment of a pupil
- recursion formula — a formula for determining the next term of a sequence from one or more of the preceding terms.
- reduction formula — a formula, such as sin (90° ± A) = cos A, expressing the values of a trigonometric function of any angle greater than 90° in terms of a function of an acute angle
- reformed spelling — a revised orthography intended to simplify the spelling of English words, especially to eliminate unpronounced letters, as by substituting thru for through, tho for though, slo for slow, etc.
- repeating firearm — a firearm capable of discharging a number of shots without reloading.
- republic of yemen — Republic of, a country in S Arabia, formed in 1990 by the merger of the Yemen Arab Republic and the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen. 207,000 sq. mi. (536,130 sq. km). Capital: Aden.
- retirement relief — (formerly, in Britain) relief from capital-gains tax given to people at or over 50 when disposing of business assets
- rheumatoid factor — an antibody that is found in the blood of many persons afflicted with rheumatoid arthritis and that reacts against globulins in the blood.
- 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.
- saint elmo's fire — corona discharge.
- scientific method — a method of research in which a problem is identified, relevant data are gathered, a hypothesis is formulated from these data, and the hypothesis is empirically tested.
- self-administered — to manage (affairs, a government, etc.); have executive charge of: to administer the law.
- 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-emancipation — the act of emancipating.
- self-estrangement — to turn away in feeling or affection; make unfriendly or hostile; alienate the affections of: Their quarrel estranged the two friends.