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16-letter words containing n, a, p, r

  • parallelepipedon — a prism with six faces, all parallelograms.
  • paraprofessional — a person trained to assist a doctor, lawyer, teacher, or other professional, but not licensed to practice in the profession.
  • parents' evening — an occasion when the parents of children at a school and their teachers come together (outside normal school hours, in the evening) in order to discuss the progress or work of the children
  • parity operation — the mathematical operation of reversing the directions of all three space coordinates. Symbol: P.
  • parliament hinge — a butt hinge the knuckle of which protrudes from the door so that the door when fully opened stands away from the wall.
  • parochialization — a parochial character, spirit, or tendency; excessive narrowness of interests or view; provincialism.
  • parole violation — an illegal act or offence that breaches the conditions of a prisoner's parole
  • parser generator — A program which takes a formal description of a grammar (e.g. in BNF) and outputs source code for a parser which will recognise valid strings obeying that grammar and perform associated actions. Unix's yacc is a well known example.
  • partial fraction — one of the fractions into which a given fraction can be resolved, the sum of such simpler fractions being equal to the given fraction: Partial fractions of 5/(x2−x) are 5/(x−1) and −5/x.
  • partial function — A function which is not defined for all arguments of its input type. E.g. f(x) = 1/x if x /= 0. The opposite of a total function. In denotational semantics, a partial function f : D -> C may be represented as a total function ft : D' -> lift(C) where D' is a superset of D and ft x = f x if x in D ft x = bottom otherwise where lift(C) = C U bottom. Bottom (LaTeX \perp) denotes "undefined".
  • partial ordering — a relation defined on a set, having the properties that each element is in relation to itself, the relation is transitive, and if two elements are in relation to each other, the two elements are equal.
  • parts of lindsey — an area in E England constituting a former administrative division of Lincolnshire
  • pass-band filter — band-pass filter
  • passenger pigeon — an extinct pigeon, Ectopistes migratorius, once found in great numbers in North America, noted for its sustained migratory flights.
  • passive transfer — Immunology. injection of lymphocytes or antibody from an immune or sensitized donor to a nonimmune host in order to impart immunity or test for allergic reactions.
  • passport control — identity check at airport, etc.
  • paterson's curse — a purple-flowered noxious plant, Echium plantagineum, a close relative of viper's bugloss, naturalized in Australia and NZ where its harmfulness to livestock has prompted attempts to limit its spread
  • pattern matching — 1. A function is defined to take arguments of a particular type, form or value. When applying the function to its actual arguments it is necessary to match the type, form or value of the actual arguments against the formal arguments in some definition. For example, the function length [] = 0 length (x:xs) = 1 + length xs uses pattern matching in its argument to distinguish a null list from a non-null one. There are well known algorithm for translating pattern matching into conditional expressions such as "if" or "case". E.g. the above function could be transformed to 2. Descriptive of a type of language or utility such as awk or Perl which is suited to searching for strings or patterns in input data, usually using some kind of regular expression.
  • pattern practice — (in foreign-language learning) a technique for practicing a linguistic structure in which students repeat a sentence or other structure, each time substituting a new element, such as a new verb, as directed by the teacher, or transforming the original structure, as in changing a statement to a question.
  • peace campaigner — someone who campaigns for peace or an end to conflict
  • peace conference — a conference where representatives of warring governments or countries sign a treaty to end conflict
  • peano arithmetic — (mathematics)   Giuseppe Peano's system for representing natural numbers inductively using only two symbols, "0" (zero) and "S" (successor). This system could be expressed as a recursive data type with the following Haskell definition: data Peano = Zero | Succ Peano The number three, usually written "SSS0", would be Succ (Succ (Succ Zero)). Addition of Peano numbers can be expressed as a simple syntactic transformation: plus Zero n = n plus (Succ m) n = Succ (plus m n) (1995-03-28)
  • peasants' revolt — the first great popular rebellion in English history (1381), caused by the imposition of an unpopular poll tax: it lasted less than a month and failed as a social revolution
  • pectoralis minor — the smaller of the two large chest muscles that assist in movements of the shoulder and upper arm
  • peegee hydrangea — a widely cultivated hydrangea, Hydrangea paniculata grandiflora, having pyramidal clusters of persistent flowers that are white on opening and turn pinkish as they mature.
  • pelican crossing — place to cross road
  • pencil and paper — An archaic information storage and transmission device that works by depositing smears of graphite on bleached wood pulp. More recent developments in paper-based technology include improved "write-once" update devices which use tiny rolling heads similar to mouse balls to deposit coloured pigment. All these devices require an operator skilled at so-called "handwriting" technique. These technologies are ubiquitous outside hackerdom, but nearly forgotten inside it. Most hackers had terrible handwriting to begin with, and years of keyboarding tend to have encouraged it to degrade further. Perhaps for this reason, hackers deprecate pencil-and-paper technology and often resist using it in any but the most trivial contexts.
  • pencil sharpener — tool for sharpening pencils to a point
  • peninsular state — Florida (used as a nickname).
  • pension mortgage — an arrangement whereby a person takes out a mortgage and pays the capital repayment instalments into a pension fund and the interest to the mortgagee. The loan is repaid out of the tax-free lump sum proceeds of the pension plan on the borrower's retirement
  • percentage point — difference: one per cent
  • perchloromethane — carbon tetrachloride.
  • peregrine falcon — a globally distributed falcon, Falco peregrinus, much used in falconry because of its swift flight: several subspecies are endangered.
  • performance bond — contract bond.
  • performance test — a test requiring little or no use of language, the test materials being designed to elicit manual or behavioral responses rather than verbal ones.
  • periodic tenancy — the letting of a dwelling for a repeated short term, as by the week, month, or quarter, with no end date
  • permanent magnet — a magnet that retains its magnetism after being removed from an external magnetic field.
  • permanganic acid — an acid, HMnO 4 , known only in solution.
  • perpendicularity — vertical; straight up and down; upright.
  • perpetual motion — the motion of a theoretical mechanism that, without any losses due to friction or other forms of dissipation of energy, would continue to operate indefinitely at the same rate without any external energy being applied to it.
  • personal details — details about a person such as their name and address
  • personal effects — belongings
  • personal hygiene — bodily cleanliness
  • personal liberty — the liberty of an individual to do his or her will freely except for those restraints imposed by law to safeguard the physical, moral, political, and economic welfare of others.
  • personal pension — a private pension scheme in which an individual contributes part of his or her salary to a financial institution, which invests it so that a lump sum is available on retirement; this is then used to purchase an annuity
  • personal pronoun — any one of the pronouns used to refer to the speaker, or to one or more to or about whom or which he or she is speaking, as, in English, I, we, you, he, she, it, they.
  • personal shopper — a person, often a store employee, whose job is to assist shoppers in selecting clothing or other merchandise.
  • personal stylist — a person employed by a rich or famous client to offer advice on clothes, hairstyles, and other aspects of personal appearance
  • personal trainer — a person who works one-on-one with a client to plan or implement an exercise or fitness regimen.
  • personal tuition — private tuition
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