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21-letter words containing o, p, e, n, m, i

  • non-maintainer upload — (operating system)   (NMU) A release of a Debian package by someone other than its usual maintainer. E.g. "The bug was fixed in a recent NMU."
  • non-repeating decimal — a decimal representation of any irrational number, having the property that no sequence of digits is repeated ad infinitum.
  • operational amplifier — a high-gain, high-input impedance amplifier, usually an integrated circuit, that can perform mathematical operations when suitably wired.
  • operational semantics — (theory)   A set of rules specifying how the state of an actual or hypothetical computer changes while executing a program. The overall state is typically divided into a number of components, e.g. stack, heap, registers etc. Each rule specifies certain preconditions on the contents of some components and their new contents after the application of the rule. It is similar in spirit to the notion of a Turing machine, in which actions are precisely described in a mathematical way. Compuare axiomatic semantics, denotational semantics.
  • ophthalmia neonatorum — inflammation of the eyes of a newborn child due to an infectious disease, as gonorrhea, contracted during birth from the infected mother.
  • partial reinforcement — the process of randomly rewarding an organism for making a response on only some of the occasions it makes it
  • peephole optimisation — (compiler)   A kind of low-level code optimisation that considers only a few adjacent machine code instructions at a time and looks for certain combinations which can be replaced with more efficient sequences. E.g. ADD R0, #1 ADD R0, #1 (add one to register R0) could be replaced by ADD R0, #2 as long as there were no jumps to the second instruction.
  • peephole optimization — peephole optimisation
  • percussion instrument — a musical instrument, as the drum, cymbal, triangle, xylophone, or piano, that is struck to produce a sound, as distinguished from string or wind instruments.
  • performance appraisal — the assessment, at regular intervals, of an employee's performance at work
  • performance indicator — a quantitative or qualitative measurement, or any other criterion, by which the performance, efficiency, achievement, etc of a person or organization can be assessed, often by comparison with an agreed standard or target
  • performance-enhancing — noting or relating to a drug or other substance used to improve one's performance in a sport or other activity requiring strength, stamina, etc.: The use of performance-enhancing steroids by athletes is banned.
  • persistence of memory — a painting (1931) by Salvador Dali.
  • personalized medicine — an approach to the practice of medicine that uses information about a patient’s unique genetic makeup and environment to customize the patient's medical care to fit his or her individual requirements.
  • pick someone's brains — to obtain information or ideas from someone
  • ploughman's spikenard — a European plant, Inula conyza, with tubular yellowish flower heads surrounded by purple bracts: family Asteraceae (composites)
  • polarizing microscope — a microscope that utilizes polarized light to reveal detail in an object, used especially to study crystalline and fibrous structures.
  • pomp and circumstance — ceremony
  • postpartum depression — Postpartum depression is a mental state involving feelings of anxiety and sudden mood swings which some women experience after they have given birth.
  • potassium bicarbonate — a white, crystalline, slightly alkaline, salty-tasting, water-soluble powder, KHCO 3 , produced by the passage of carbon dioxide through an aqueous potassium carbonate solution: used in cookery as a leavening agent and in medicine as an antacid.
  • potassium thiocyanate — a colorless, crystalline, hygroscopic, water-soluble solid, KSCN, used chiefly in the manufacture of chemicals, dyes, and drugs.
  • poweropen environment — (operating system)   (POE) A definition containing API and ABI specifications based on the PowerPC architecture. It is not an operating system. The presence of the ABI specification in the POE distinguishes it from other open systems (POSIX, XPG4, etc.) since it allows platform independent binary compatibility which is otherwise typically limited to particular hardware. The POE is an open standard, derived from AIX and conforming to industry open standards including POSIX, XPG4 and Motif. The POE specification will be publicly available to anyone wishing to produce either application programs or hardware platforms. The PowerOpen Association will provide the necessary conformance testing and POE branding. The POE is hardware bus independent. System implementations can range from laptop computers to supercomputers. It requires a multi-user, multitasking operating system. It provides networking support, an X Window System extension, a Macintosh Application Services extension and Motif. It is conformance tested and certified by an independent party (the PowerOpen Association). The POE specification is targeted for availability in the first quarter of 1994. The PowerOpen Association will soon have some of the information material available on-line.
  • prader-willi syndrome — a congenital condition characterized by obsessive eating, obesity, learning difficulties, and small genitalia
  • premature ejaculation — a male psychosexual disorder in which ejaculation occurs soon after the commencement of sexual intercourse.
  • premium savings bonds — (in Britain) bonds issued by the Treasury since 1956 for purchase by the public. No interest is paid but there is a monthly draw for cash prizes of various sums
  • president pro tempore — a senator, usually a senior member of the majority party, who is chosen to preside over the Senate in the absence of the vice president.
  • price competitiveness — pricing goods or services so that they are competitive with the prices of other companies
  • primitive dicotyledon — any living relative of early angiosperms that branched off before the evolution of monocotyledons and eudicotyledons. The group comprises about 5 per cent of the world's plants
  • production department — the department of a business or organization responsible for manufacturing products
  • profit-sharing scheme — a scheme employing profit-sharing; a system in which a portion of the net profit of a business is distributed to its employees, usually in proportion to their wages or their length of service
  • propantheline bromide — a substance, C 2 3 H 3 0 BrNO 3 , used in the treatment of peptic ulcers.
  • protest demonstration — a manifestation of protest by public rally, parade, etc
  • psychoneuroimmunology — the study of the effects of psychological factors on the immune system
  • pulse code modulation — a form of modulation that transforms a wave-form, as an audio signal, into a binary signal in which information is conveyed by a coded order of pulses for transmission, storage on a disk, or processing by a computer. Abbreviation: PCM.
  • pulse-code modulation — a form of modulation that transforms a wave-form, as an audio signal, into a binary signal in which information is conveyed by a coded order of pulses for transmission, storage on a disk, or processing by a computer. Abbreviation: PCM.
  • pulse-time modulation — radio transmission in which the carrier is modulated to produce a series of pulses timed to transmit the amplitude and pitch of a signal. Abbr.: PTM.
  • put someone wise (to) — to give someone information, an explanation, etc. (about); enlighten someone (concerning)
  • put something over on — to deceive; trick
  • pyrenean mountain dog — a large heavily built dog of an ancient breed originally used to protect sheep from wild animals: it has a long thick white coat with a dense ruff
  • quantum teleportation — a hypothetical technique to instantly transfer properties from one quantum system to another without contact, or to transfer a quantum state to an arbitrarily distant location.
  • queer someone's pitch — to upset someone's plans
  • reading comprehension — a text that students use to help them improve their reading skills, by reading it and answering questions relating to the text. Sometimes used as a test or examination of reading skills. A reading comprehension can be in the student's own or another language
  • real operating system — (operating system, abuse)   The sort the speaker is used to. People from the BSDophilic academic community are likely to issue comments like "System V? Why don't you use a *real* operating system?", people from the commercial/industrial Unix sector are known to complain "BSD? Why don't you use a *real* operating system?", and people from IBM object "Unix? Why don't you use a *real* operating system?" See holy wars, religious issues, proprietary, Get a real computer!.
  • recompression chamber — hyperbaric chamber.
  • reinforcement therapy — a behavior modification technique in which appropriate behavior is strengthened through systematic reinforcement.
  • replacement algorithm — The method used to determine which entry in an associative cache to flush to main memory when it is desired to cache a new block of data. The "least recently used" algorithm flushed the block which has not been accessed for the longest time. A random replacement algorithm picks any block with equal probability.
  • residual unemployment — the unemployment that remains in periods of full employment, as a result of those mentally, physically, or emotionally unfit to work
  • return from interrupt — (programming)   (RTI) An instruction mnemonic on many computers including the 6502 and 6800. The variant "RETI" is found among former Zilog Z80 hackers (almost nobody programs these things in assembly code anymore). The Intel 80x86 equivalent is "IRET".
  • return the compliment — repay sb's kindness with a kind act
  • sales finance company — a finance company that purchases, at a discount, installment contracts from dealers or that finances retail sales.
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