16-letter words containing o, f, a, c
- oak leaf cluster — a U.S. military decoration in the form of a small bronze twig bearing four oak leaves and three acorns, worn on the ribbon of another decoration for valor, wounds, or distinguished service to signify a second award of the same medal.
- of a certain age — of an unspecified age, but no longer young
- of it own accord — If something happens of its own accord, it seems to happen by itself, without anyone making it happen.
- off-road vehicle — An off-road vehicle is a vehicle that is designed to travel over rough ground.
- official referee — (in England) a circuit judge attached to the High Court who is empowered to try certain cases, esp where a detailed examination of accounts or other documents is involved
- on the back foot — at a disadvantage; outmanoeuvred or outclassed by an opponent
- once and for all — former; having at one time been: the once and future king.
- one's cup of tea — the dried and prepared leaves of a shrub, Camellia sinensis, from which a somewhat bitter, aromatic beverage is prepared by infusion in hot water.
- one-way function — (cryptography, mathematics) A function which is easy to compute but whose inverse is very difficult to compute. Such functions have important applications in cryptography, specifically in public-key cryptography. See also: trapdoor function.
- ordnance factory — a factory that makes military weapons and ammunition
- orthoformic acid — a hypothetical acid, HC(OH) 3 , known only in the form of its esters.
- out of character — the aggregate of features and traits that form the individual nature of some person or thing.
- ovals of cassini — the locus of a point x, whose distance from two fixed points, a and b, is such that |x–a| |x–b| is a constant
- pacific sturgeon — a dark gray sturgeon, Acipenser transmontanus, inhabiting marine and fresh waters along the northwestern coast of North America, valued as a food and sport fish.
- packing fraction — Physics. a measure of the stability of an atomic nucleus, equal to 10 4 multiplied by the mass defect and divided by the mass number.
- pair of scissors — two-bladed cutting tool
- 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".
- peace conference — a conference where representatives of warring governments or countries sign a treaty to end conflict
- peregrine falcon — a globally distributed falcon, Falco peregrinus, much used in falconry because of its swift flight: several subspecies are endangered.
- perforated ulcer — an ulcer that bursts through the stomach wall and leaks food and gastric juices into the abdominal cavity
- 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.
- personal effects — belongings
- place of worship — religious house: church, temple
- placement office — an office in a university that offers students careers advice and help to find employment
- platform-balance — a scale with a platform for holding the items to be weighed.
- point of contact — (networking) (POC) An individual associated with a particular Internet entity (IP network, domain, ASN).
- 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.
- prespecification — the act of specifying.
- pull a long face — to look sad, glum, disapproving, etc.
- question of fact — a question concerning the reality of an alleged event or circumstance in a trial by jury, usually determined by the jury.
- 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
- rape of the lock — a mock-epic poem (1712) by Alexander Pope.
- rate of exchange — exchange rate.
- reclassification — categorization in a different way
- reflection plane — a plane through a crystal that divides the crystal into two halves that are mirror images of each other.
- 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.
- 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.
- 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.
- romantic fiction — a genre of fiction focused on romantic love
- saccharification — to convert (starch) into sugar.
- safety-conscious — conscious of being safe and preventing danger
- sales conference — meeting of salespeople
- scotch blackface — one of a Scottish breed of mountain sheep having a black face and growing long, coarse wool.
- self-complacency — pleased with oneself; self-satisfied; smug.
- self-containment — the state of being self-contained.