29-letter words containing n, t, y
- methylenedioxymethamphetamine — The psychoactive drug MDMA or Ecstasy, an amphetamine that produces entactogenic, psychedelic, and stimulant effects.
- microelectromechanical system — (hardware) (MEMS) The integration of mechanical structures (moving parts) with microelectronics. MEMS devices are "custom" designed for a purpose which requires a mechanical action to be controlled by a computer. Applications include sensors, medical devices, process controls. See also nanotechnology.
- modified frequency modulation — (storage) (MFM, Modified FM, or sometimes "Multiple Frequency Modulation") A modification to the original frequency modulation scheme for encoding data on magnetic disks. MFM allows more than 1 symbol per flux transition (up to 3), giving greater density of data. It is used with a data rate of between 250-500 kbit/s on industry standard 3.5" and 5.25" low and high density diskettes, and up to 5 Mbit/s on ST-506 hard disks. Except for 1.44 MB floppy disks, this encoding is obsolete. Other data encoding schemes include GCR, FM, RLL. See also: PRML.
- monday-morning quarterbacking — wisdom after the event, esp by spectators
- multiple personality disorder — psychiatric illness: split personality
- nuclear regulatory commission — an independent agency, created in 1975, that licenses and regulates the nonmilitary use of nuclear energy. Abbreviation: NRC.
- object compatibility standard — (OCS) An 88open standard for compilers and linkers.
- on-line analytical processing — (database) (OLAP) A category of database software which provides an interface such that users can transform or limit raw data according to user-defined or pre-defined functions, and quickly and interactively examine the results in various dimensions of the data. OLAP primarily involves aggregating large amounts of diverse data. OLAP can involve millions of data items with complex relationships. Its objective is to analyze these relationships and look for patterns, trends, and exceptions. The term was originally coined by Dr. Codd in 1993 with 12 "rules". Since then, the OLAP Council, many vendors, and Dr. Codd himself have added new requirements and confusion. Richard Creeth and Nigel Pendse define OLAP as fast analysis of shared multidimensional information. Their definition requires the system to respond to users within about five seconds. It should support logical and statistical processing of results without the user having to program in a 4GL. It should implement all the security requirements for confidentiality and concurrent update locking. The system must provide a multidimensional conceptual view of the data, including full support for multiple hierarchies. Other aspects to consider include data duplication, RAM and disk space requirements, performance, and integration with data warehouses. Various bodies have attempted to come up with standards for OLAP, including The OLAP Council and the Analytical Solutions Forum (ASF), however, the Microsoft OLE DB for OLAP API is the most widely adopted and has become the de facto standard.
- opportunity management system — (business) (OMS) A system that stores sales opportunities and related information. Each sales lead can be tracked with information such as source, type, worth, status, likelihood of closure etc. An OMS can perform other related tasks such as prioritising sales calls and generating analyses that assist the fine-tuning of marketing strategies. See also Customer Relationship Management.
- ordinary national certificate — a further education qualification in the United Kingdom, equivalent to two A Levels
- organization of african unity — an organization of African nations formed in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (1963), for the purpose of coordinating policy and promoting unity among African peoples. Abbreviation: OAU, O.A.U.
- passive-dependent personality — a personality disorder characterized by a lack of self-confidence and self-reliance and consequent surrender to and dependence on others to take responsibility for major areas of one's life.
- personalized array translator — (language) (PAT) A small subset of APL. E-mail: <[email protected]>.
- real-time structured analysis — (programming) (RTSA) Any version of structured analysis capable of modelling real-time aspects of software.
- recommended dietary allowance — the amount of an essential nutrient, as a vitamin or mineral, that has been established by the Food and Nutrition Board of the National Academy of Sciences as adequate to meet the average daily nutritional needs of most healthy persons according to age group and sex. Abbreviation: RDA.
- respiratory distress syndrome — Also called hyaline membrane disease. an acute lung disease of the newborn, occurring primarily in premature babies and babies born to ill mothers, characterized by rapid breathing, flaring of the nostrils, inelastic lungs, edema of the extremities, and in some cases the formation of a hyaline membrane on the lungs caused by a lack of surfactant in the immature lung tissue. Abbreviation: RDS.
- royal canadian mounted police — Canadian police on horseback
- send someone/something flying — If you send someone or something flying or if they go flying, they move through the air and fall down with a lot of force.
- sexually transmitted diseases — any disease characteristically transmitted by sexual contact, as gonorrhea, syphilis, genital herpes, and chlamydia. Abbreviation: STD.
- sing from the same hymn sheet — If you say that people, especially people in the same organization, are singing from the same hymn sheet or are singing from the same song sheet, you mean that they are saying the same things in public about something and appear to agree about it.
- symbolic automatic integrator — (mathematics, tool) (SAINT) A symbolic mathematics program written in Lisp by J. Slagle at MIT in 1961.
- synchronous data link control — (communications) (SDLC) An IBM protocol. A discipline conforming to subsets of the ADCCP of ANSI and the HDLC of the International Organization for Standardization. SDLC manages synchronous, code-transparent, bit-serial communication which can be duplex or half-duplex; switched or non-switched; point-to-point, multipoint, or loop. Compare Binary Synchronous Communication.
- synchronous digital hierarchy — (communications, standard) (SDH) An international digital telecommunications network hierarchy which standardises transmission around the bit rate of 51.84 megabits per second, which is also called STS-1. Multiples of this bit rate comprise higher bit rate streams. Thus STS-3 is 3 times STS-1, STS-12 is 12 times STS-1, and so on. STS-3 is the lowest bit rate expected to carry ATM traffic, and is also referred to as STM-1 (Synchronous Transport Module-Level 1). The SDH specifies how payload data is framed and transported synchronously across optical fibre transmission links without requiring all the links and nodes to have the same synchronized clock for data transmission and recovery (i.e. both the clock frequency and phase are allowed to have variations, or be plesiochronous). SDH offers several advantages over the current multiplexing technology, which is known as Plesiochronous Digital Hierarchy. Where PDH lacks built-in facilities for automatic management and routing, and locks users into proprietary methods, SDH can improve network reliability and performance, offers much greater flexibility and lower operating and maintenance costs, and provides for a faster provision of new services. Under SDH, incoming traffic is synchronized and enhanced with network management bits before being multiplexed into the STM-1 fixed rate frame. The fundamental clock frequency around which the SDH or SONET framing is done is 8 KHz or 125 microseconds. SONET (Synchronous Optical Network) is the American version of SDH.
- system v interface definition — (SVID) A standard allowing source code portability between different platforms running Unix System V.
- the northern ireland assembly — the devolved legislature of Northern Ireland, located at Stormont in Belfast
- the royal shakespeare company — a British theatre company based mainly in Stratford-upon-Avon
- the royal ulster constabulary — (formerly) the police force in Northern Ireland from 1922 to 2001, superseded by the Police Service of Northern Ireland
- thyrotropin-releasing hormone — a small peptide hormone, produced by the hypothalamus, that controls the release of thyrotropin by the pituitary. Abbreviation: TRH.
- to commit something to memory — If you commit something to paper or to writing, you record it by writing it down. If you commit something to memory, you learn it so that you will remember it.
- to get sb in the party spirit — to make someone feel like going to a party
- to have a learning disability — to be unable to reach the average standard of people of the same age group as regards intellectual and cognitive skills and performance
- to lead someone a merry dance — If someone leads you a merry dance, they make you do things over a long period of time which cause you problems and do not benefit you in any way.
- to pay cash on the barrelhead — to pay at the time of purchase
- to shoot yourself in the foot — If you shoot yourself in the foot, something you say or do causes you harm.
- to stand on your own two feet — If someone has to stand on their own two feet, they have to be independent and manage their lives without help from other people.
- to take the bull by the horns — If you take the bull by the horns, you do something that you feel you ought to do even though it is difficult, dangerous, or unpleasant.
- to the best of your knowledge — If you say that something is true to your knowledge or to the best of your knowledge, you mean that you believe it to be true but it is possible that you do not know all the facts.
- to throw good money after bad — If you say that someone is throwing good money after bad, you are critical of them for trying to improve a bad situation by spending more money on it, instead of doing more thoughtful or practical things to improve it.
- to thumb your nose at someone — If you thumb your nose at someone, you behave in a way that shows that you do not care what they think.
- to wash your hands of someone — If you wash your hands of someone or something, you refuse to be involved with them any more or to take responsibility for them.
- trinitrophenylmethylnitramine — tetryl.
- trust territory of new guinea — (until 1975) an administrative division of the former Territory of Papua and New Guinea, consisting of the NE part of the island of New Guinea together with the Bismarck Archipelago; now part of Papua New Guinea
- united kingdom unionist party — a political party (1995–2008), based in Northern Ireland: it was non-sectarian but opposed to a united Ireland
- valley of ten thousand smokes — a volcanic area in SW Alaska, in Katmai National Monument.
- windows hardware quality labs — (body, standard) (WHQL) A Microsoft body that produces and supports the Microsoft Hardware Compatibility Test kit for current Microsoft operating systems. Products are tested with the kit to ensure that they meet Microsoft standards for compatibility with Windows and to qualify to use the "Designed for Microsoft Windows" logos.
- yet another compiler compiler — (tool, language) (yacc) The LALR parser generator found on most Unix systems. Also, the language used to describe the syntax of another language to yacc (the program). Implementations: ayacc, YAY, perln-byacc, SASL-Yacc - "Yacc in SASL - An Exercise in Functional Programming", Simon Peyton-Jones, Software Prac & Exp 15:807-820 (1985). Mentions also a BCPL implementation. Yacc++ - 1990. An object-oriented rewrite of yacc, supports regular expressions, produces an LR1 grammar parser. Chris Clark, Compiler Resources Inc, +1 (508) 435-5016. MLYACC - Implementation and output in SML/NJ. ftp:research.att.com/dist/ml/75.tools.tar.Z. A version, by David Poole at Montana University has been retargeted to Turbo Pascal. See also Bison, yet another, Yet Another Yacc.
- you can't hear yourself think — If you say that you can't hear yourself think, you are complaining and emphasizing that there is a lot of noise, and that it is disturbing you or preventing you from doing something.