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20-letter words containing f, e, r, o, t

  • on (or off) the air — that is (or is not) broadcasting or being broadcast
  • on the factory floor — in a factory; as a factory worker
  • order of the thistle — an ancient Scottish order of knighthood revived by James VII of Scotland in 1687. It consists of the sovereign, 16 knights brethren, and extra members created by statute. It is the equivalent of the Order of the Garter, and is usually conferred on Scots
  • ousterhout's fallacy — Ousterhout's dichotomy
  • overseer of the poor — a minor official of a parish attached to the workhouse or poorhouse
  • paper qualifications — qualifications gained through official examinations, etc, rather than through experience
  • parallel of altitude — almucantar.
  • parallel of latitude — parallel (def 9).
  • patent foramen ovale — a congenital heart defect resulting from failure of the foramen ovale to close shortly after birth.
  • pave the way for sth — If one thing paves the way for another, it creates a situation in which it is possible or more likely that the other thing will happen.
  • period of revolution — a rather large interval of time that is meaningful in the life of a person, in history, etc., because of its particular characteristics: a period of illness; a period of great profitability for a company; a period of social unrest in Germany.
  • person of no account — (University of California at Santa Cruz) Used when referring to a person with no network address, frequently to forestall confusion. Most often as part of an introduction: "This is Bill, a person of no account, but he used to be [email protected]". Compare return from the dead.
  • pest control officer — a person who gets rid of pests such as rats and mice
  • photoelectric effect — the phenomenon in which the absorption of electromagnetic radiation, as light, of sufficiently high frequency by a surface, usually metallic, induces the emission of electrons from the surface.
  • piezoelectric effect — the property exhibited by some nonconducting crystals of becoming electrically polarized when mechanically strained and of becoming mechanically strained when an electric field is applied.
  • portfolio employment — the practice of working for several employers simultaneously rather than working full-time for a single employer
  • post office protocol — (messaging, protocol)   (POP) A protocol designed to allow single-user computers to retrieve electronic mail from a POP server via TCP/IP. The default port is 110. The POP server might be a computer with a permanent Internet connection whereas its clients might only connect to it occasionally, e.g. by modem. There are (in 1994) three versions: POP, POP2, and POP3. Later versions are NOT compatible with earlier ones.
  • potential difference — voltage
  • power of appointment — the authority granted by a donor to a donee to select the person or persons who are to enjoy property rights or income upon the death of the donor or of the donee or after the termination of existing rights or interests.
  • powhatan confederacy — a network of Algonquian-speaking Indian settlements in Virginia that was ruled by Powhatan.
  • prefecture apostolic — a territory in the early stage of missionary development.
  • pride of the morning — light mist or precipitation observed at sea in the morning and regarded as indicating a fine day.
  • proof of the pudding — the true value or quality of something, as seen when it is experienced, tried, or put to use: The proof of the pudding for a business is what customers say about it.
  • quantum field theory — any theory in which fields are treated by the methods of quantum mechanics; each field can then be regarded as consisting of particles of a particular kind, which may be created and annihilated.
  • queen of the prairie — a tall plant, Filipendula rubra, of the rose family, having branching clusters of pink flowers, growing in meadows and prairies.
  • radio interferometer — any of several different types of instrumentation designed to observe interference patterns of electromagnetic radiation at radio wavelengths: used in the discovery and measurement of radio sources in the atmosphere.
  • rapid reaction force — a force that can be deployed swiftly to a site of conflict or potential conflict
  • recursive definition — a definition consisting of a set of rules such that by repeated application of the rules the meaning of the definiendum is uniquely determined in terms of ideas that are already familiar.
  • reflecting telescope — an optical instrument for making distant objects appear larger and therefore nearer. One of the two principal forms (refracting telescope) consists essentially of an objective lens set into one end of a tube and an adjustable eyepiece or combination of lenses set into the other end of a tube that slides into the first and through which the enlarged object is viewed directly; the other form (reflecting telescope) has a concave mirror that gathers light from the object and focuses it into an adjustable eyepiece or combination of lenses through which the reflection of the object is enlarged and viewed. Compare radio telescope.
  • refracting telescope — an optical instrument for making distant objects appear larger and therefore nearer. One of the two principal forms (refracting telescope) consists essentially of an objective lens set into one end of a tube and an adjustable eyepiece or combination of lenses set into the other end of a tube that slides into the first and through which the enlarged object is viewed directly; the other form (reflecting telescope) has a concave mirror that gathers light from the object and focuses it into an adjustable eyepiece or combination of lenses through which the reflection of the object is enlarged and viewed. Compare radio telescope.
  • refrigerator-freezer — a large appliance housing one compartment for refrigerating food and another for freezing.
  • refuse disposal unit — a unit or part of a sink that disposes of waste food, etc, by grinding
  • request for comments — (standard)   (RFC) One of a series, begun in 1969, of numbered Internet informational documents and standards widely followed by commercial software and freeware in the Internet and Unix communities. Few RFCs are standards but all Internet standards are recorded in RFCs. Perhaps the single most influential RFC has been RFC 822, the Internet electronic mail format standard. The RFCs are unusual in that they are floated by technical experts acting on their own initiative and reviewed by the Internet at large, rather than formally promulgated through an institution such as ANSI. For this reason, they remain known as RFCs even once adopted as standards. The RFC tradition of pragmatic, experience-driven, after-the-fact standard writing done by individuals or small working groups has important advantages over the more formal, committee-driven process typical of ANSI or ISO. Emblematic of some of these advantages is the existence of a flourishing tradition of "joke" RFCs; usually at least one a year is published, usually on April 1st. Well-known joke RFCs have included 527 ("ARPAWOCKY", R. Merryman, UCSD; 22 June 1973), 748 ("Telnet Randomly-Lose Option", Mark R. Crispin; 1 April 1978), and 1149 ("A Standard for the Transmission of IP Datagrams on Avian Carriers", D. Waitzman, BBN STC; 1 April 1990). The first was a Lewis Carroll pastiche; the second a parody of the TCP/IP documentation style, and the third a deadpan skewering of standards-document legalese, describing protocols for transmitting Internet data packets by carrier pigeon. The RFCs are most remarkable for how well they work - they manage to have neither the ambiguities that are usually rife in informal specifications, nor the committee-perpetrated misfeatures that often haunt formal standards, and they define a network that has grown to truly worldwide proportions. See also For Your Information, STD.
  • request for proposal — (programming)   (RFP) The publication by a prospective software purchaser of details of the required system in order to attract offers by software developers to supply it. Software development under contract starts with the selection of the software developer by the customer. A request for proposal (also called in Britain an "invitation to tender") is the beginning of the selection process.
  • respecter of persons — one whose behavior toward people is influenced by their social status, prestige, etc.
  • restriction fragment — a length of DNA cut from the strand by a restriction enzyme.
  • return from the dead — (jargon)   To regain access to the net after a long absence. Compare person of no account.
  • return of the native — a novel (1878) by Thomas Hardy.
  • ring of the nibelung — Richard Wagner's tetralogy of music dramas: Das Rheingold (completed 1869), Die Walküre (completed 1870), Siegfried (completed 1876), and Götterdämmerung (completed 1876): the cycle was first performed at Bayreuth, 1876.
  • ringing off the hook — If your phone is ringing off the hook, so many people are trying to telephone you that it is ringing constantly.
  • royal air force list — an official list of all serving commissioned officers of the RAF and reserve officers liable for recall
  • run off at the mouth — Anatomy, Zoology. the opening through which an animal or human takes in food. the cavity containing the structures used in mastication. the structures enclosing or being within this cavity, considered as a whole.
  • saint anthony's fire — any of certain skin conditions that are of an inflammatory or gangrenous nature, as erysipelas, hospital gangrene, or ergotism.
  • senior aircraftwoman — a rank in the Royal Air Force comparable to that of a private in the army, though not the lowest rank in the Royal Air Force
  • separation of powers — the principle or system of vesting in separate branches the executive, legislative, and judicial powers of a government.
  • shear transformation — a map of a coordinate space in which one coordinate is held fixed and the other coordinate or coordinates are shifted.
  • sinfonia concertante — a type of concerto for two or more solo instruments accompanied by an orchestra
  • snowflake generation — the generation of people who became adults in the 2010s, viewed as being less resilient and more prone to taking offence than previous generations
  • sodium fluoroacetate — a white, amorphous, water-soluble, poisonous powder, C 2 H 2 FO 2 Na, used as a rodenticide.
  • software engineering — the process of writing computer programs
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