16-letter words containing f, r, o
- permafrost table — the variable surface constituting the upper limit of permafrost. Compare frostline (def 2).
- person of colour — a person who is not White
- personal effects — belongings
- petrified forest — a national park in E Arizona, containing petrified coniferous trees about 170 000 000 years old
- phosphor fatigue — screen saver
- place of worship — religious house: church, temple
- plaster of paris — calcined gypsum in white, powdery form, used as a base for gypsum plasters, as an additive of lime plasters, and as a material for making fine and ornamental casts: characterized by its ability to set rapidly when mixed with water.
- platform-balance — a scale with a platform for holding the items to be weighed.
- polyvinyl formal — a colorless, water-insoluble, polyvinyl acetal produced from partially hydrolyzed polyvinyl acetate and formaldehyde, used chiefly in the manufacture of lacquers.
- portfolio worker — a person in portfolio employment
- post-reformation — the act of reforming; state of being reformed.
- powerfully built — (of a person, esp a man) big and physically strong, with large muscles
- powerpc platform — (architecture, standard) (PPCP, PReP - PowerPC Reference Platform, formerly CHRP - Common Hardware Reference Platform) An open system standard, designed by IBM, intended to ensure compatibility among PowerPC-based systems built by different companies. The PReP standard specifies the PCI bus, but will also support ISA, MicroChannel and PCMCIA. PReP-compliant systems will be able to run the Macintosh OS, OS/2, WorkplaceOS, AIX, Solaris, Taligent and Windows NT. IBM systems will (of course) be PReP-compliant. Apple's first PowerPC Macintoshes will not be compliant, but future ones may be.
- preference stock — preferred stock.
- presence of mind — a calm state of mind that allows one to think clearly or act effectively in an emergency.
- prespecification — the act of specifying.
- press conference — a prearranged interview with news reporters, held to elicit publicity or, as granted by a dignitary, public official, research scientist, etc., to fulfill a request from the press.
- pribilof islands — a group of islands in the Bering Sea, off SW Alaska, belonging to the US: the breeding ground of the northern fur seal. Area: about 168 sq km (65 sq miles)
- pride oneself on — to be proud of
- prisoner of bill — (humour) (PoB) A derisory term, in use generally among Unix users, for anyone who uses Microsoft products either because they don't know there is anything better (i.e. Unix) or because they would be incapable of working anything more complex (i.e. Unix). The interesting and widespread presumption among users of the term is that (at least at the time of writing, 1998) using anything other than Unix or a Microsoft OS (whether VMS, Macintosh, Amiga) is so eccentric a choice as to be at least somewhat praiseworthy.
- professionalisms — professional character, spirit, or methods.
- proficiency test — an exam which test how proficient or skilled someone is in a particular activity, field of study, language, etc
- proof of concept — the stage during the development of a product when it is established that the product will function as intended
- proof of postage — a document, such as a receipt, etc, that proves that you have posted or mailed something
- put a foot wrong — to make a mistake
- put your feet up — If you put your feet up, you relax or have a rest, especially by sitting or lying with your feet supported off the ground.
- racial profiling — the use of personal characteristics or behavior patterns to make generalizations about a person, as in gender profiling.
- radius of action — the maximum distance that a ship, aircraft, or land vehicle can travel from its base and return without refuelling
- ramen profitable — If a startup business is ramen profitable, it is barely profitable, just enough to allow the founder to live on the cheapest diet.
- rape of the lock — a mock-epic poem (1712) by Alexander Pope.
- rate of exchange — exchange rate.
- rational fortran — (language) (RATFOR) Brian Kernighan's Fortran preprocessor that allows programming with C-like control flow. RATFOR is mainly of historical significance. A translator from Ratfor to Fortran IV was posted to comp.sources.Unix volume 13.
- reasons of state — political justifications for an immoral act
- reclassification — categorization in a different way
- reconnection fee — an amount of money that a company charges customers in order to reconnect their supply of electricity, water, gas, or telephone after it has been stopped
- red flour beetle — a reddish-brown flour beetle, Tribolium castaneum, that feeds on stored grain, dried fruit, etc.
- reflection plane — a plane through a crystal that divides the crystal into two halves that are mirror images of each other.
- reflexive domain — A domain satisfying a recursive domain equation. E.g. D = D -> D.
- refresher course — a study course serving as a review of previous education.
- refreshment room — a room in a railway station where food and drink was served
- refrigerator car — a freight car having either an ice chest or machinery for chilling perishables and sometimes having a heating unit to keep perishables from freezing.
- refuse collector — someone who collects of rubbish and waste, usually in a rubbish or refuse truck, before final disposal
- registration fee — a fee paid to register, enrol or sign up for (a course, etc)
- regius professor — Crown-appointed holder of a university chair
- reidentification — an act or instance of identifying; the state of being identified.
- releasing factor — a substance usually of hypothalamic origin that triggers the release of a particular hormone from an endocrine gland.
- remember oneself — to recover one's good manners after a lapse; stop behaving badly
- rich text format — (RTF) An interchange format from Microsoft for exchange of documents between Word and other document preparation systems.
- right about face — Military. a command, given to a soldier or soldiers at attention, to turn the body about toward the right so as to face in the opposite direction. the act of so turning in a prescribed military manner.
- robin goodfellow — Puck (def 1).