14-letter words containing o, c, a, n
- autoconfiscate — (software, jargon) A term coined by Noah Friedman meaning to set up or modify a source-code distribution so that it configures and builds using the GNU project's autoconf/automake/libtools suite.
- autocovariance — (statistics) The covariance of a signal with another part of the same signal.
- autodesk, inc. — (company) The distributors of the AutoCAD CAD package. Address: Sausalito, CA, USA.
- avariciousness — The state or quality of being avaricious.
- aviation cadet — one who trains to become an officer in an air force.
- avoidance play — a play by the declarer designed to prevent a particular opponent from taking the lead.
- award ceremony — ceremony at which an award is presented
- back and forth — If someone moves back and forth, they repeatedly move in one direction and then in the opposite direction.
- back formation — the invention of a new word on the assumption that a familiar word is derived from it. The verbs edit and burgle were so created from editor and burglar
- back o' beyond — remote; out-of-the-way; isolated.
- back of beyond — a very remote place
- back to nature — If you want to get back to nature, you want to return to a simpler way of living.
- back-and-forth — backward and forward; side to side; to and fro: a back-and-forth shuttling of buses to the stadium; the back-and-forth movement of a clock's pendulum.
- back-formation — the analogical creation of one word from another word that appears to be a derived or inflected form of the first by dropping the apparent affix or by modification.
- backbone cabal — (networking) A group of large-site administrators who pushed through the Great Renaming and reined in the chaos of Usenet during most of the 1980s. The cabal mailing list disbanded in late 1988 after a bitter internal cat-fight.
- backing vocals — a vocal accompaniment for a pop singer
- backside-front — backend-to.
- ball indicator — a flight instrument that measures the angle of roll about an aircraft's horizontal axis, thereby indicating whether or not the aircraft is skidding or slipping.
- ballroom dance — a social dance, popular since the beginning of the 20th century, in conventional rhythms, such as the foxtrot and the quickstep
- balsaminaceous — of, relating to, or belonging to the Balsaminaceae, a family of flowering plants, including balsam and touch-me-not, that have irregular flowers and explosive capsules
- balto-slavonic — a hypothetical subfamily of Indo-European languages consisting of Baltic and Slavonic. It is now generally believed that similarities between them result from geographical proximity rather than any special relationship
- bamboo curtain — (esp in the 1950s and 1960s) the political and military barrier to communications around the People's Republic of China
- bancroft prize — one of a group of annual awards for literary achievement in American history and biography: administered by Columbia University.
- barnacle goose — a N European goose, Branta leucopsis, that has a black-and-white head and body and grey wings
- base community — (especially in South America) a group of people taking part in religious devotions and Bible study, who seek to apply this in their socioeconomic and political situation.
- base component — the system of rules in a transformational grammar that specify the deep structure of the language
- basque country — Theregion comprising three provinces in N Spain, on the Bay of Biscay, inhabited by Basques: 2,803 sq mi (7,260 sq km); pop. 2,104,000
- basso cantante — a bass voice with an upper range that is more developed than that of the basso profundo.
- basso continuo — continuo.
- bayonet charge — a charge by riflemen with fixed bayonets
- bayonet socket — a socket for a bayonet fitting
- beautification — Making beautiful, beautifying, improving the appearance of something.
- beauty contest — A beauty contest is a competition in which young women are judged to decide which one is the most beautiful.
- beclomethasone — a potent synthetic corticosteroid, C 28 H 37 ClO 7 , prepared as an inhalant in the treatment of bronchial asthma.
- belisha beacon — a flashing light in an orange globe mounted on a post, indicating a pedestrian crossing on a road
- benday process — a process for adding tone or shading, as in reproducing drawings, by the overlay on the plate of patterns, as of dots
- benzyl alcohol — a colorless, faintly aromatic, slightly water-soluble liquid, C 7 H 8 O, used chiefly as a solvent in the manufacture of perfumes and flavorings, and as an intermediate in the synthesis of benzyl esters and ethers.
- beta reduction — [lambda-calculus] The application of a lambda abstraction to an argument expression. A copy of the body of the lambda abstraction is made and occurrences of the bound variable being replaced by the argument. E.g. (\ x . x+1) 4 --> 4+1 Beta reduction is the only kind of reduction in the pure lambda-calculus. The opposite of beta reduction is beta abstraction. These are the two kinds of beta conversion. See also name capture.
- beyond compare — If you describe something as beyond compare, you mean that it is extremely good or extremely great.
- bibliomaniacal — relating to a bibliomaniac
- binary counter — (electronics, hardware) A digital circuit which has a clock input and a number of count outputs which give the number of clock cycles. The output may change either on rising or falling clock edges. The circuit may also have a reset input which sets all outputs to zero when asserted. The counter may be either a synchronous counter or a ripple counter.
- bioaeronautics — the use of aircraft in the discovery, development, and protection of natural and biological resources
- biocontainment — the confinement, as by sealed-off chambers, of materials that are harmful or potentially harmful to life.
- bioequivalence — the equality of strength, bioavailability, and dosage of various drug products
- bioinformatics — the branch of information science concerned with large databases of biochemical or pharmaceutical information
- black diamonds — carbonado1 .
- black-on-black — concerning black people exclusively
- blanco-fombona — Rufino [roo-fee-naw] /ruˈfi nɔ/ (Show IPA), 1874–1944, Venezuelan author.
- block calendar — a calendar in the form of a block of sheets each printed with the date of one day
- block faulting — the process by which tensional forces in the earth's crust cause large bodies of rock to founder.