21-letter words containing i, n, l, s, t, e
- of one's own volition — If you do something of your own volition, you do it because you have decided for yourself that you will do it and not because someone else has told you to do it.
- oil-in-water emulsion — An oil-in-water emulsion is a mixture in which an oily medicine is dispersed in water or other liquid.
- old spanish practices — irregular practices among a group of workers to gain increased financial allowances, reduced working hours, etc
- operational semantics — (theory) A set of rules specifying how the state of an actual or hypothetical computer changes while executing a program. The overall state is typically divided into a number of components, e.g. stack, heap, registers etc. Each rule specifies certain preconditions on the contents of some components and their new contents after the application of the rule. It is similar in spirit to the notion of a Turing machine, in which actions are precisely described in a mathematical way. Compuare axiomatic semantics, denotational semantics.
- peephole optimisation — (compiler) A kind of low-level code optimisation that considers only a few adjacent machine code instructions at a time and looks for certain combinations which can be replaced with more efficient sequences. E.g. ADD R0, #1 ADD R0, #1 (add one to register R0) could be replaced by ADD R0, #2 as long as there were no jumps to the second instruction.
- personality inventory — a questionnaire designed to measure personality types or characteristics.
- pipelined burst cache — Pipeline Burst Cache
- plate glass insurance — Plate glass insurance is insurance coverage against damage to or breakage of large panes of glass such as shop windows.
- play russian roulette — take a foolish risk
- political correctness — Political correctness is the attitude or policy of being extremely careful not to offend or upset any group of people in society who have a disadvantage, or who have been treated differently because of their sex, race, or disability.
- prefect of discipline — a senior master in a Jesuit school or college
- prince rupert's metal — a brass composed of from about 60 to 85 percent copper and about 15 to 40 percent zinc, used to imitate gold.
- projection television — a television picture display system consisting of a special receiver and an optical system that projects an enlarged picture on a screen.
- pulse code modulation — a form of modulation that transforms a wave-form, as an audio signal, into a binary signal in which information is conveyed by a coded order of pulses for transmission, storage on a disk, or processing by a computer. Abbreviation: PCM.
- pulse height analyser — a multichannel analyser that sorts pulses into selected amplitude ranges
- pulse height analyzer — an instrument that records or counts an electrical pulse if its amplitude falls within specified limits: used in nuclear physics research for the determination of energy spectra of nuclear radiations
- pulse-code modulation — a form of modulation that transforms a wave-form, as an audio signal, into a binary signal in which information is conveyed by a coded order of pulses for transmission, storage on a disk, or processing by a computer. Abbreviation: PCM.
- pulse-time modulation — radio transmission in which the carrier is modulated to produce a series of pulses timed to transmit the amplitude and pitch of a signal. Abbr.: PTM.
- put sb in their place — If you put someone in their place, you show them that they are less important or clever than they think they are.
- quantitative analysis — Chemistry. the analysis of a substance to determine the amounts and proportions of its chemical constituents. Compare qualitative analysis.
- rayleigh distribution — (mathematics) A curve that yields a good approximation to the actual labour curves on software projects.
- real estate insurance — Real estate insurance is insurance of property, land, and buildings.
- real operating system — (operating system, abuse) The sort the speaker is used to. People from the BSDophilic academic community are likely to issue comments like "System V? Why don't you use a *real* operating system?", people from the commercial/industrial Unix sector are known to complain "BSD? Why don't you use a *real* operating system?", and people from IBM object "Unix? Why don't you use a *real* operating system?" See holy wars, religious issues, proprietary, Get a real computer!.
- reconnaissance flight — a flight made by an aircraft in order to obtain military information about a particular place
- reconnaissance patrol — a patrol made by soldiers in order to obtain military information about a particular place
- relaxation oscillator — a nonsinusoidal oscillator, the timing of which is controlled by the charge and discharge time constants of resistance and capacitance components
- requirements analysis — (project) The process of reviewing a business's processes to determine the business needs and functional requirements that a system must meet.
- residual unemployment — the unemployment that remains in periods of full employment, as a result of those mentally, physically, or emotionally unfit to work
- reverse polish syntax — postfix notation
- roll with the punches — a thrusting blow, especially with the fist.
- rolling in the aisles — (of an audience) overcome with laughter
- safe in the knowledge — If you do something safe in the knowledge that something else is the case, you do the first thing confidently because you are sure of the second thing.
- sail against the wind — to sail a course that slants slightly away from the true direction of the wind; sail closehauled
- saint elias mountains — a mountain range between SE Alaska and the SW Yukon, Canada. Highest peak: Mount Logan, 5959 m (19 550 ft)
- saint lawrence seaway — a series of channels, locks, and canals between Montreal and the mouth of Lake Ontario, a distance of 182 miles (293 km), enabling most deep-draft vessels to travel from the Atlantic Ocean, up the St. Lawrence River, to all the Great Lakes ports: developed jointly by the U.S. and Canada.
- saint valentine's day — February 14, observed in honor of St. Valentine as a day for the exchange of valentines and other tokens of affection.
- salam-weinberg theory — the electroweak theory.
- san gabriel mountains — a mountain range in S California, N of Los Angeles. Highest peak, San Antonio Peak, 10,080 feet (3072 meters).
- santa cruz water lily — a South American aquatic plant, Victoria cruziana, of the water lily family, having floating leaves from 2–5 feet (0.6–1.5 meters) and deep pink or red flowers.
- schlieren photography — a type of photography which records schlieren
- school superintendent — an official whose job is to oversee school administration within a district
- scintillation counter — a device for detecting and measuring radioactivity, having a crystal scintillator, a photoelectric cell sensitive to the light from scintillations, and an amplifier.
- self-characterization — portrayal; description: the actor's characterization of a politician.
- semantic differential — a technique for measuring the connotative meaning of concepts by having an individual rate each concept on a series of graduated scales, each scale defined by a pair of polar adjectives, as good–bad or strong–weak.
- sense and sensibility — a novel (1811) by Jane Austen.
- sentential connective — any of several words or their equivalent symbols used in logical formulas to connect propositions, as “or,” “not,” “and,” “if and only if.”.
- sequoia national park — a national park in central California: giant sequoia trees. 604 sq. mi. (1565 sq. km).
- set the world on fire — the earth or globe, considered as a planet.
- seven-segment display — (electronics) (SSD) A kind of display element consisting of seven independently controllable lines arranged as a rectangular figure eight. A seven-segment display is the simplest device that can display any of the digits zero to nine (and some other characters) by lighting different combinations of lines. They are often seen in electronic calculators or measuring equipment.
- sierra madre oriental — the system of mountains in the east of Mexico