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21-letter words containing o, r, s, i

  • background processing — the ability of a system to perform a low-priority task while, at the same time, dealing with a main application
  • bad conduct discharge — a discharge of a person from military service for an offense less serious than one for which a dishonorable discharge is given.
  • banach-tarski paradox — (mathematics)   It is possible to cut a solid ball into finitely many pieces (actually about half a dozen), and then put the pieces together again to get two solid balls, each the same size as the original. This paradox is a consequence of the Axiom of Choice.
  • barbiturate poisoning — poisoning caused by overdose of a barbiturate
  • basis of articulation — a configuration of the speech tract that represents the most neutral articulatory configuration for a given language.
  • be on the danger list — to be critically ill in hospital
  • beat one's brains out — Anatomy, Zoology. the part of the central nervous system enclosed in the cranium of humans and other vertebrates, consisting of a soft, convoluted mass of gray and white matter and serving to control and coordinate the mental and physical actions.
  • bernoulli's principle — the principle that in a liquid flowing through a pipe the pressure difference that accelerates the flow when the bore changes is equal to the product of half the density times the change of the square of the speed, provided friction is negligible
  • binomial distribution — a statistical distribution giving the probability of obtaining a specified number of successes in a specified number of independent trials of an experiment with a constant probability of success in each. Symbol: Bi (n, p), where n is the number of trials and p the probability of success in each
  • biobehavioral science — any of the various branches of the life sciences, as neurobiology, neurochemistry, or neuroendocrinology, that deal with biological aspects of behavior.
  • biological psychiatry — a school of psychiatric thought concerned with the medical treatment of mental disorders, especially through medication, and emphasizing the relationship between behavior and brain function and the search for physical causes of mental illness.
  • blow one's brains out — to kill oneself by shooting oneself in the head
  • brainstorming session — a meeting held for the purpose of intensive discussion to solve problems or generate ideas
  • british north america — (formerly) Canada or its constituent regions or provinces that formed part of the British Empire
  • bulletin board system — (communications, application)   (BBS, bboard /bee'bord/, message board, forum; plural: BBSes) A computer and associated software which typically provides an electronic message database where people can log in and leave messages. Messages are typically split into topic groups similar to the newsgroups on Usenet (which is like a distributed BBS). Any user may submit or read any message in these public areas. The term comes from physical pieces of board on which people can pin messages written on paper for general consumption - a "physical bulletin board". Ward Christensen, the programmer and operator of the first BBS (on-line 1978-02-16) called it a CBBS for "computer bulletin board system". Since the rise of the World-Wide Web, the term has become antiquated, though the concept is more popular than ever, with many websites featuring discussion areas where users can post messages for public consumption. Apart from public message areas, some BBSes provided archives of files, personal electronic mail and other services of interest to the system operator (sysop). Thousands of BBSes around the world were run from amateurs' homes on MS-DOS boxes with a single modem line each. Although BBSes were traditionally the domain of hobbyists, many connected directly to the Internet (accessed via telnet), others were operated by government, educational, and research institutions. Fans of Usenet or the big commercial time-sharing bboards such as CompuServe, CIX and GEnie tended to consider local BBSes the low-rent district of the hacker culture, but they helped connect hackers and users in the personal-micro and let them exchange code. Use of this term for a Usenet newsgroup generally marks one either as a newbie fresh in from the BBS world or as a real old-timer predating Usenet.
  • burroughs corporation — (company)   A company which merged with Sperry Univac to form Unisys Corporation. They produced the Datatron 200 series among other computers.
  • butterfly common lisp — A parallel version of Common LISP for the BBN Butterfly computer.
  • by fair means or foul — If someone tries to achieve something by fair means or foul, they use every means possible in order to achieve it, and they do not care if their behaviour is dishonest or unfair.
  • caroline of brunswick — 1768–1821, wife of George IV of the United Kingdom: tried for adultery (1820)
  • cartesian coordinates — a system of representing points in space in terms of their distance from a given origin measured along a set of mutually perpendicular axes. Written (x,y,z) with reference to three axes
  • casing collar locator — A casing collar locator is a tool that is placed down the borehole to allow depths to be measured by detecting the position of the casing collar.
  • catalyst-to-oil ratio — The catalyst-to-oil ratio is the amount of a catalyst relative to the amount of oil, which with temperature affects the yield of a process.
  • category merchandiser — A category merchandiser is a person whose job is to maintain stocks, manage displays and promote sales of a certain product category such as footwear.
  • characteristic vector — a vector for which there exists a scalar such that the value of the vector under a given transformation is equal to the scalar times the vector.
  • charity commissioners — (in Britain) members of a commission constituted to keep a register of charities and control charitable trusts
  • chequebook journalism — Chequebook journalism is the practice of paying people large sums of money for information about crimes or famous people in order to get material for newspaper articles.
  • chinese forget-me-not — an eastern Asian plant, Cynoglossum amabile, of the borage family, having lance-shaped leaves and clustered, showy, blue, pink, or white flowers.
  • chinese water torture — a form of torture in which water is made to drip for a long period of time onto a victim's forehead to drive him insane
  • chink in one's armour — a small but fatal weakness
  • christmas decorations — decorations of different kinds appropriate to Christmas, such as tinsel, candles, images of angels, etc.
  • civil rights movement — campaign for human freedoms
  • class-relation method — (programming)   A design technique based on the concepts of object-oriented programming and the Entity-Relationship model from the French company Softeam.
  • clayton antitrust act — an act of Congress in 1914 supplementing the Sherman Antitrust Act and establishing the FTC.
  • clerk to the justices — (in England) a legally qualified person who sits in court with lay justices to advise them on points of law
  • clostridium difficile — Clostridium difficile is a bacterium that causes severe diarrhoea. It is commonly found in hospitals. C.diff is also used.
  • collins street farmer — a businessman who invests in farms, land, etc
  • comfortably-furnished — containing comfortable furniture
  • commercial television — television companies which make money by selling advertising
  • commercial translator — (language)   An English-like pre-COBOL language for business data processing.
  • commission of inquiry — (in Britain) a group that is set up to investigate something
  • committal proceedings — a preliminary hearing in a magistrates' court to decide if there is a case to answer
  • committing magistrate — a magistrate who decides if there is enough evidence for a case to proceed
  • communications server — (operating system)   IBM's rebranding of ACF.
  • comparative statement — a financial statement with figures arranged in two or more parallel columns, each column representing a fiscal year or other period, used to compare performance between periods.
  • comparison microscope — a microscope having two objective lenses and using a system of prisms to form in one eyepiece adjacent images of two different objects.
  • compensation neurosis — an unconscious attempt to retain physical or psychological symptoms of illness when some advantage may be obtained (distinguished from malingering).
  • complete metric space — (theory)   A metric space in which every sequence that converges in itself has a limit. For example, the space of real numbers is complete by Dedekind's axiom, whereas the space of rational numbers is not - e.g. the sequence a[0]=1; a[n_+1]:=a[n]/2+1/a[n].
  • completing the square — a method, usually of solving quadratic equations, by which a quadratic expression, as x 2 − 4 x + 3, is written as the sum or difference of a perfect square and a constant, x 2 − 4 x + 4 + 3 − 4 = (x − 2) 2 − 1, by addition and subtraction of appropriate constant terms.
  • composition of forces — the combination, by vector algebra, of two or more forces into a single equivalent force (the resultant)
  • computer aided design — (application)   (CAD) The part of CAE concerning the drawing or physical layout steps of engineering design. Often found in the phrase "CAD/CAM" for ".. manufacturing".
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