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24-letter words containing o, n, e, s, f

  • floating-point specratio — SPECfp92
  • flue gas desulfurization — Flue gas desulfurization is the removal of pollutants containing sulfur from flue gas.
  • follow someone's example — If you follow someone's example, you behave in the same way as they did in the past, or in a similar way, especially because you admire them.
  • footloose and fancy-free — If you describe someone as footloose and fancy-free, you mean that they are not married or in a similar relationship, and you therefore consider them to have very few responsibilities or commitments.
  • fray at/around the edges — If you say that something is fraying at the edges or is fraying around the edges, you mean that it has an uncertain or unsteady quality, for example because it is gradually being spoiled or destroyed.
  • free and accepted masons — a member of a widely distributed secret order (Free and Accepted Masons) having for its object mutual assistance and the promotion of brotherly love among its members.
  • free software foundation — (body)   (FSF) An organisation devoted to the creation and dissemination of free software, i.e. software that is free from licensing fees or restrictions on use. The Foundation's main work is supporting the GNU project, started by Richard Stallman (RMS), partly to proselytise for his position that information is community property and all software source should be shared. The GNU project has developed the GNU Emacs editor and a C compiler, gcc, replacements for many Unix utilities and many other tools. A complete Unix-like operating system (HURD) is in the works (April 1994). Software is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License, which also provides a good summary of the Foundation's goals and principles. The Free Software Foundation raises most of its funds from distributing its software, although it is a charity rather than a company. Although the software is freely available (e.g. by FTP - see below) users are encouraged to support the work of the FSF by paying for their distribution service or by making donations. One of the slogans of the FSF is "Help stamp out software hoarding!" This remains controversial because authors want to own, assign and sell the results of their labour. However, many hackers who disagree with RMS have nevertheless cooperated to produce large amounts of high-quality software for free redistribution under the Free Software Foundation's imprimatur. See copyleft, General Public Virus, GNU archive site. Unofficial WWW pages: PDX, DeLorie. E-mail: <[email protected]>. Address: Free Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA. Telephone: +1 (617) 876 3296.
  • frequent shopper program — A frequent shopper program is one that rewards customers for purchases made on multiple visits, and builds up points entitling them to reduced prices and free items.
  • functional specification — (programming, project)   A description of what a system (e.g. a piece of software) does or should do (but not how it should do it). The functional specification is one of the inputs to the design process. See IEEE/ANSI Std. 610.12-1990.
  • get on the wrong side of — to come into disfavour with
  • give hostages to fortune — to place oneself in a position in which misfortune may strike through the loss of what one values most
  • gottfried von strassburg — early 13th-century German poet; author of the incomplete epic Tristan and Isolde, the version of the legend that served as the basis of Wagner's opera
  • grandfather, father, son — (operating system)   (GFS) A backup rotation scheme in which a "grandfather" backup is performed on the first Monday of each month, a "father" backup is performed on every other Monday and a "son" backup is performed on every other day of the week. Grandfather tapes are kept for a year, father tapes for a month and son tapes for a week. The exact schedule (and thus the number of tapes required) may vary, as may the choice of full backup or incremental backup, but the idea is that it should be possible to restore versions of any file of different ages: e.g. yesterday's, last week's or last year's version.
  • gregorio lopez y fuentes — Gregorio [gre-gaw-ryaw] /grɛˈgɔ ryɔ/ (Show IPA), 1895–1966, Mexican writer.
  • have at one's fingertips — to have available for instant use
  • high-fructose corn syrup — corn syrup to which enzymes have been added to change some of the glucose to fructose, making the product sweeter than regular corn syrup. Abbreviation: HFCS.
  • house of representatives — the lower legislative branch in many national and state bicameral governing bodies, as in the United States, Mexico, and Japan.
  • immunofluorescence assay — a diagnostic blood test using the technique of immunofluorescence. Abbreviation: IFA.
  • in one's heart of hearts — Anatomy. a hollow, pumplike organ of blood circulation, composed mainly of rhythmically contractile smooth muscle, located in the chest between the lungs and slightly to the left and consisting of four chambers: a right atrium that receives blood returning from the body via the superior and inferior vena cavae, a right ventricle that pumps the blood through the pulmonary artery to the lungs for oxygenation, a left atrium that receives the oxygenated blood via the pulmonary veins and passes it through the mitral valve, and a left ventricle that pumps the oxygenated blood, via the aorta, throughout the body.
  • in words of one syllable — simply; bluntly
  • infectious mononucleosis — an acute, infectious form of mononucleosis associated with Epstein-Barr virus, characterized by sudden fever and a benign swelling of lymph nodes.
  • information superhighway — internet
  • iterated function system — (graphics)   (IFS) A class of fractals that yield natural-looking forms like ferns or snowflakes. Iterated Function Systems use a very easy transformation that is done recursively.
  • knowledge sharing effort — (project)   An ARPA project developing techniques and methods for building large-scale knowledge bases which are sharable and reusable.
  • lab for computer science — MIT. http://lcs.mit.edu/.
  • land of the midnight sun — any of those countries containing land within the Arctic Circle where there is a midnight sun in midsummer, especially Norway, Sweden, or Finland.
  • laugh in a person's face — to show open contempt or defiance towards a person
  • law of supply and demand — the theory that prices are determined by the interaction of supply and demand: an increase in supply will lower prices if not accompanied by increased demand, and an increase in demand will raise prices unless accompanied by increased supply
  • leave someone to himself — not to control or direct someone
  • line of least resistance — the easiest, but not necessarily the best or most honourable, course of action
  • liquid components of gas — Liquid components of gas are associated hydrocarbons in natural gas, which include ethane, propane, and butane.
  • look someone in the face — to look directly at a person without fear or shame
  • macintosh user interface — (operating system)   The graphical user interface used by Apple Computer's Macintosh family of personal computers, based on graphical representations of familiar office objects (sheets of paper, files, wastepaper bin, etc.) positioned on a two-dimensional "desktop" workspace. Programs and data files are represented on screen by small pictures (icons). An object is selected by moving a mouse over the real desktop which correspondingly moves the pointer on screen. When the pointer is over an icon on screen, the icon is selected by pressing the button on the mouse. A hierarchical file system is provided that lets a user "drag" a document (a file) icon into and out of a folder (directory) icon. Folders can also contain other folders and so on. To delete a document, its icon is dragged into a trash can icon. For people that are not computer enthusiasts, managing files on the Macintosh is easier than using the MS-DOS or Unix command-line interpreter. The Macintosh always displays a row of menu titles at the top of the screen. When a mouse button is pressed over a title, a pull-down menu appears below it. With the mouse button held down, the option within the menu is selected by pointing to it and then releasing the button. Unlike the IBM PC, which, prior to Microsoft Windows had no standard graphical user interface, Macintosh developers almost always conform to the Macintosh interface. As a result, users are comfortable with the interface of a new program from the start even if it takes a while to learn all the rest of it. They know there will be a row of menu options at the top of the screen, and basic tasks are always performed in the same way. Apple also keeps technical jargon down to a minimum. Although the Macintosh user interface provides consistency; it does not make up for an application program that is not designed well. Not only must the application's menus be clear and understandable, but the locations on screen that a user points to must be considered. Since the mouse is the major selecting method on a Macintosh, mouse movement should be kept to a minimum. In addition, for experienced typists, the mouse is a cumbersome substitute for well-designed keyboard commands, especially for intensive text editing.
  • make ducks and drakes of — to use recklessly; squander or waste
  • make one's presence felt — If you make your presence felt, you do something which makes people notice you or pay attention to you.
  • ministry of the interior — a government department that deals with the domestic or internal affairs of a country, esp law and order
  • not to have the foggiest — to have no idea whatsoever
  • officers' training corps — part of the British Army which provides military leadership training to students at UK universities
  • open shortest-path first — Open Shortest-Path First Interior Gateway Protocol
  • open software foundation — (body)   (OSF) A foundation created by nine computer vendors, (Apollo, DEC, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Bull, Nixdorf, Philips, Siemens and Hitachi) to promote "Open Computing". It is planned that common operating systems and interfaces, based on developments of Unix and the X Window System will be forthcoming for a wide range of different hardware architectures. OSF announced the release of the industry's first open operating system - OSF/1 on 23 October 1990.
  • passive balance of trade — a negative balance of trade
  • photomechanical transfer — a method of producing photographic prints or offset printing plates from paper negatives by a chemical transfer process rather than by exposure to light
  • presumption of innocence — the rebuttable presumption of the innocence of the defendant in a criminal action in Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence, placing upon the prosecution the burden of proof of the defendant's guilt.
  • professional association — a body of persons engaged in the same profession, formed usually to control entry into the profession, maintain standards, and represent the profession in discussions with other bodies
  • professional corporation — a corporation formed by one or more licensed practitioners, especially medical or legal, to operate their practices on a corporate plan. Abbreviation: PC, P.C.
  • professional programming — paranoid programming
  • public relations officer — a person who is responsible for communications with the public
  • rocky mountain whitefish — mountain whitefish.
  • san francisco de macoris — a city in the N Dominican Republic.
  • san joaquin valley fever — coccidioidomycosis.
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