18-letter words containing p, e, o, l, s, d
- oedipus at colonus — a tragedy by Sophocles, written toward the end of his life and produced posthumously in 401? b.c.
- optical disc drive — optical disk drive
- optical disk drive — (hardware) (Or "optical disc drive", "optical storage") A generic term for any device that reads and/or writes optical media, i.e. compact discs, DVDs and/or Blu-ray discs or future media that uses light (from a small laser) to read data off a removable, rotating disk. At least one such drive is commonly installed in most personal computers to allow them to play and/or record audio and video media and load and store data such as program installers. The floppy disk has been replaced by optical media due to its vastly greater capacity, e.g. 50,000 megabytes for a dual-layer blu-ray disc compared with 1.5 megabytes for a floppy (over 30,000 times as much).
- payload specialist — an astronaut trained to handle highly complex or classified equipment carried aboard a space shuttle and to conduct experiments in space.
- pectoral sandpiper — an American sandpiper, Calidris melanotos, the male of which, when courting, inflates its chest conspicuously.
- people's democracy — (in Communist ideology) a country or form of government in transition from bourgeois democracy to socialism. In this stage there is more than one class, the largest being the proletariat, led by the Communist Party, which is therefore the dominant power
- percussion welding — a form of resistance welding in which the required pressure is provided by a hammerlike blow.
- personal bodyguard — a person employed to protect a particular person
- pescadores-islands — (used with a plural verb) Penghu.
- phosphatidylserine — any of a class of phospholipids occurring in biological membranes and fats
- physical education — systematic instruction in sports, exercises, and hygiene given as part of a school or college program.
- plate-glass window — a window that has glass which has been formed by rolling
- play cat and mouse — Also called cat and rat. a children's game in which players in a circle keep a player from moving into or out of the circle and permit a second player to move into or out of the circle to escape the pursuing first player.
- play second fiddle — be considered less important
- population density — ratio: inhabitants to area
- positively charged — having a positive charge
- postviral syndrome — debilitating condition occurring as a sequel to viral illness
- potassium chloride — a white or colorless, crystalline, water-soluble solid, KCl, used chiefly in the manufacture of fertilizers and mineral water, and as a source of other potassium compounds.
- potassium fluoride — a white, crystalline, hygroscopic, toxic powder, KF, used chiefly as an insecticide, a disinfectant, and in etching glass.
- precedence lossage — /pre's*-dens los'*j/ A misunderstanding of operator precedence resulting in unintended grouping of arithmetic or logical operators when coding an expression. Used especially of mistakes in C code due to the nonintuitively low precedence of "&", "|", "^", "<<" and ">>". For example, the following C expression, intended to test the least significant bit of x, x & 1 == 0 is parsed as x & (1 == 0) which is always zero (false). Some lazy programmers ignore precedence and parenthesise everything. Lisp fans enjoy pointing out that this can't happen in *their* favourite language, which eschews precedence entirely, requiring one to use explicit parentheses everywhere.
- prisoner's dilemma — (in game theory) a scenario in which the outcome of one person's decision is determined by the simultaneous decisions of the other participants, resulting in a bad outcome for all of them if all act in their own self-interest.
- process scheduling — multitasking
- pseudo-socialistic — of or relating to socialists or socialism.
- pseudointellectual — a person exhibiting intellectual pretensions that have no basis in sound scholarship.
- pseudotuberculosis — an acute, sometimes fatal disease of rodents, birds, and other animals, including humans, caused by the bacterium Yersinia (Pasteurella) pseudotuberculosis, and characterized by the formation of nodules resembling those that result from tuberculosis.
- pull one's head in — the upper part of the body in humans, joined to the trunk by the neck, containing the brain, eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.
- radical expression — an expression in which radical signs appear.
- red-spotted purple — any color having components of both red and blue, such as lavender, especially one deep in tone.
- reinforced plastic — plastic with fibrous matter, such as carbon fibre, embedded in it to confer additional strength
- rhodes scholarship — one of a number of scholarships at Oxford University, established by the will of Cecil Rhodes, for selected students (Rhodes scholars) from the British Commonwealth and the United States.
- scholarship holder — a person who, because of academic merit, receives financial aid for their studies
- seafloor spreading — a process in which new ocean floor is created as molten material from the earth's mantle rises in margins between plates or ridges and spreads out.
- secondary syphilis — the second stage of syphilis, characterized by eruptions of the skin and mucous membrane.
- self-comprehending — to understand the nature or meaning of; grasp with the mind; perceive: He did not comprehend the significance of the ambassador's remark.
- september holidays — a period of time in September when people do not have to go to school, college or work
- sheltered workshop — a place of employment for persons with disabilities where their rights are protected and their needs are met.
- soda-lime feldspar — plagioclase.
- sodium hyposulfite — sodium thiosulfate.
- sodium polysulfide — a yellow-brown, water-soluble, granular powder, Na 2 S n , used chiefly in the manufacture of sulfur dyes, insecticides, and synthetic rubber.
- solitary sandpiper — a North American sandpiper, Tringa solitaria, of inland wetlands, having a brownish-gray, white-spotted back and whitish underparts.
- spotted flycatcher — a European woodland songbird, Muscicapa striata, with a greyish-brown streaked plumage: family Muscicapidae (Old World flycatchers)
- supraorbital ridge — browridge.
- the encyclopedists — the writers of the French Encyclopedia (1751-72) edited by Diderot and d'Alembert, which contained the advanced ideas of the period
- the lords temporal — (in Britain) peers other than bishops in their capacity as members of the House of Lords
- white-spotted hyla — a type of tree frog (H. leucophyllata) of tropical America
- wild passionflower — the maypop, Passiflora incarnata.