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13-letter words containing r, e, l, a

  • fibre channel — (storage, networking, communications)   An ANSI standard originally intended for high-speed SANs connecting servers, disc arrays, and backup devices, also later adapted to form the physical layer of Gigabit Ethernet. Development work on Fibre channel started in 1988 and it was approved by the ANSI standards committee in 1994, running at 100Mb/s. More recent innovations have seen the speed of Fibre Channel SANs increase to 10Gb/s. Several topologies are possible with Fibre Channel, the most popular being a number of devices attached to one (or two, for redundancy) central Fibre Channel switches, creating a reliable infrastructure that allows servers to share storage arrays or tape libraries. One common use of Fibre Channel SANs is for high availability databaseq clusters where two servers are connected to one highly reliable RAID array. Should one server fail, the other server can mount the array itself and continue operations with minimal downtime and loss of data. Other advanced features include the ability to have servers and hard drives seperated by hundreds of miles or to rapidly mirror data between servers and hard drives, perhaps in seperate geographic locations.
  • fiddle around — waste time doing sth trivial
  • field battery — a small unit of usually four field guns
  • field marshal — an officer of the highest military rank in the British and certain other armies, and of the second highest rank in the French army.
  • field sparrow — a common North American finch, Spizella pusilla, found in brushy pasturelands.
  • figured glass — plate or sheet glass having a pattern rolled onto one side of the surface.
  • file transfer — (networking)   Copying a file from one computer to another over a computer network. See also File Transfer Protocol, Kermit, Network File System, rcp, uucp, XMODEM, ZMODEM.
  • filmographies — Plural form of filmography.
  • filter factor — a number indicating the increased exposure that a particular film should receive when a photograph is taken using a particular filter.
  • filterability — The state or condition of being filterable.
  • firewall code — 1. The code you put in a system (say, a telephone switch) to make sure that the users can't do any damage. Since users always want to be able to do everything but never want to suffer for any mistakes, the construction of a firewall is a question not only of defensive coding but also of interface presentation, so that users don't even get curious about those corners of a system where they can burn themselves. 2. Any sanity check inserted to catch a can't happen error. Wise programmers often change code to fix a bug twice: once to fix the bug, and once to insert a firewall which would have arrested the bug before it did quite as much damage.
  • first refusal — If someone has first refusal on something that is being sold or offered, they have the right to decide whether or not to buy it or take it before it is offered to anyone else.
  • flabbergasted — to overcome with surprise and bewilderment; astound.
  • flabbergaster — to overcome with surprise and bewilderment; astound.
  • flabergasting — Present participle of flabergast.
  • flag of truce — a white flag displayed as an invitation to the enemy to confer, or carried as a sign of peaceful intention by one sent to deal with the enemy.
  • flame-thrower — an implement that kills weeds by scorching them with a directed flow of flaming gas.
  • flameproofing — Present participle of flameproof.
  • flamethrowers — Plural form of flamethrower.
  • flash picture — a photograph made using flash photography.
  • flatbed lorry — a lorry with a flat platform for its body
  • flatbed press — a printing machine on which the type forme is carried on a flat bed under a revolving paper-bearing cylinder
  • flatbed truck — a truck with a flat platform for its body
  • flavoproteins — Plural form of flavoprotein.
  • fleet admiral — the highest ranking naval officer, ranking next above admiral.
  • fleet air arm — the aviation branch of the Royal Navy
  • flight leader — a pilot who commands a flight of military airplanes.
  • float chamber — Automotive. the bowl-shaped section of a carburetor in which a reserve of fuel is maintained, the fuel level being regulated by a float.
  • floating rate — fluctuating exchange rate
  • floor furnace — a small self-contained furnace placed just below the floor of the space to be heated.
  • floor manager — a person assigned to direct the proceedings on the floor of an assembly, as at a political convention.
  • floral emblem — a flower or plant serving as the emblem of a city, state, nation, etc.
  • flower garden — plot for flowers
  • flowering ash — a variety of ash tree that produces conspicuous flowers
  • fluid-extract — a liquid preparation, containing alcohol as a solvent or as a preservative, that contains in each cubic centimeter the medicinal activity of one gram of the crude drug in powdered form.
  • flunitrazepam — a powerful benzodiazepine sedative, C 16 H 12 FN 3 O 3 , that causes semiconsciousness and memory blackouts: has been implicated in date rapes and is illegal in the U.S.
  • fluoroacetate — a toxic chemical compound, C2H2FNaO2, occurring naturally in certain plants, and commonly used as rat poison
  • flutterboards — Plural form of flutterboard.
  • fly fisherman — one who fishes by fly-casting
  • flying saucer — any of various disk-shaped objects allegedly seen flying at high speeds and altitudes, often with extreme changes in speed and direction, and thought by some to be manned by intelligent beings from outer space.
  • focal seizure — an epileptic manifestation arising from a localized anomaly in the brain, as a small tumor or scar, and usually involving a single motor or sensory mechanism but occasionally spreading to other areas and causing convulsions and loss of consciousness.
  • fool's errand — a completely absurd, pointless, or useless errand.
  • foolhardiness — recklessly or thoughtlessly bold; foolishly rash or venturesome.
  • foolheartedly — Foolishly. In a foolhardy manner. Without thinking about the consequences.
  • for dear life — the condition that distinguishes organisms from inorganic objects and dead organisms, being manifested by growth through metabolism, reproduction, and the power of adaptation to environment through changes originating internally.
  • for values of — (jargon)   A common rhetorical maneuver at MIT is to use any of the canonical random numbers as placeholders for variables. "The max function takes 42 arguments, for arbitrary values of 42". "There are 69 ways to leave your lover, for 69 = 50". This is especially likely when the speaker has uttered a random number and realises that it was not recognised as such, but even "non-random" numbers are occasionally used in this fashion. A related joke is that pi equals 3 - for small values of pi and large values of 3. This usage probably derives from the programming language MAD (Michigan Algorithm Decoder), an ALGOL-like language that was the most common choice among mainstream (non-hacker) users at MIT in the mid-1960s. It had a control structure FOR VALUES OF X = 3, 7, 99 DO ... that would repeat the indicated instructions for each value in the list (unlike the usual FOR that generates an arithmetic sequence of values). MAD is long extinct, but similar for-constructs still flourish (e.g. in Unix's shell languages).
  • foramen ovale — the small, oval opening in the wall that separates the atria of the heart in a normal fetus: it allows blood to bypass the nonfunctioning fetal lungs until the time of birth when it gradually closes up
  • foraminiferal — Of, pertaining to, or resembling the foraminifers; foraminiferous.
  • force a smile — to make oneself smile
  • forced labour — labour done because of force; compulsory labour
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