for preformated text, 
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 for headings. Most systems will ignore the case of tags and attributes but lower case should be used for compatibility with XHTML. The web Consortium (W3C) is the international standards body for HTML. See also weblint.  
 improved mercury autocode — (language)   (IMP) A version of Autocode used to program the Edinburgh Multi Access System (EMAS), one of the first operating systems written in a high-level language, apparently predating Unix. Luis Damas' Prolog interpreter in IMP for EMAS led to C-Prolog. 
 
 in (or out of) mothballs — put into (or taken from) a condition of being stored or in reserve 
 
 instrumental conditioning — conditioning (def 1). 
 
 intercommunication system — a communication system within a building, ship, airplane, local area, etc., with a loudspeaker or receiver for listening and a microphone for speaking at each of two or more points. 
 
 intermittent claudication — pain and cramp in the calf muscles, aggravated by walking and caused by an insufficient supply of blood 
 
 java run-time environment — (language)   (JRE) The part of the Java Development Kit required to run Java programs. The JRE consists of the Java Virtual Machine, the Java platform core classes and supporting files. It does not include the compiler, debugger or other tools present in the JDK. The JRE is the smallest set of executables and files that constitute the standard Java platform. 
 
 jean-maurice-Émile baudot — (person)   (1845-1903) The inventor of the Baudot code. Baudot joined the French Post & Telegraph Administration in 1869 as a telegraph operator. In his own time he developed a code for sending several messages at once. In 1874 Baudot patented his first printing telegraph where signals were translated onto paper tape. The Baudot code was adopted first in France and then by other nations for  and  transmissions. The unit of transmission speed, baud, is named after him. 
 
 khakass autonomous region — an autonomous region in the Russian Federation, in S Siberia. 19,161 sq. mi. (49,627 sq. km). Capital: Abakan. 
 
 leaf distribution limited — A UK connectivity software supplier which also provides SERVELAN, a country-wide Internet access service. E-mail: <[email protected]>. Address: 7 Elmwood, Chineham Business Park, Crockford Lane, BASINGSTOKE RG24 0WG. Telephone: +44 (1256) 707 777. Fax: +44 (1256) 707 555. 
 
 make bricks without straw — a block of clay hardened by drying in the sun or burning in a kiln, and used for building, paving, etc.: traditionally, in the U.S., a rectangle 2.25 × 3.75 × 8 inches (5.7 × 9.5 × 20.3 cm), red, brown, or yellow in color. 
 
 make one's blood run cold — the fluid that circulates in the principal vascular system of human beings and other vertebrates, in humans consisting of plasma in which the red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets are suspended. 
 
 marcus aurelius antoninus — Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius. 
 
 marcus-valerius-martialis — (Marcus Valerius Martialis) a.d. 43?–104? Roman epigrammatist, born in Spain. 
 
 maximum transmission unit — (networking)   (MTU) The largest number of bytes of "payload" data a frame can carry, not counting the frame's header and trailer. A frame is a single unit of transportation on the data link layer. It consists of header data plus data which was passed down from the network layer (e.g. an IP datagram) plus sometimes trailer data. An Ethernet (V2) frame has a MTU of 1500 bytes but the size of the frame can be up to 1526 bytes (22 byte header, 4 byte CRC trailer). See also fragmentation. 
 
 memorandum of association — a document giving details such as the company's name, the purpose of the company, and the address of its registered office that is legally required when incorporating a company in certain countries such as the UK 
 
 metal oxide semiconductor — a three-layer sandwich of a metal, an insulator (usually an oxide of the substrate), and a semiconductor substrate, used in integrated circuits. Abbreviation: MOS. 
 
 minimal brain dysfunction — (no longer in technical use) attention deficit disorder. 
 
 mount kenya national park — a national park in Kenya, located in the regions of Mount Kenya that are above 3200 m (10 500 ft); now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the park covers 1420 sq km (548 sq miles) 
 
 multi-scene control board — preset board. 
 
 multinational corporation — international business 
 
 my favourite toy language — (jargon, language)   (MFTL) Describes a talk on a programming language design that is heavy on syntax (with lots of BNF), sometimes even talks about semantics (e.g. type systems), but rarely, if ever, has any content (see content-free). More broadly applied to talks - even when the topic is not a programming language --- in which the subject matter is gone into in unnecessary and meticulous detail at the sacrifice of any conceptual content. "Well, it was a typical MFTL talk". 2. A language about which the developers are passionate (often to the point of prosyletic zeal) but no one else cares about. Applied to the language by those outside the originating group. "He cornered me about type resolution in his MFTL." The first great goal in the mind of the designer of an MFTL is usually to write a compiler for it, then bootstrap the design away from contamination by lesser languages by writing a compiler for it in itself. Thus, the standard put-down question at an MFTL talk is "Has it been used for anything besides its own compiler?". On the other hand, a language that *cannot* be used to write its own compiler is beneath contempt. See break-even point, toolsmith. 
 
 national insurance number — a number allocated to UK citizens so that they can pay national insurance 
 
 national unity government — a government formed by a coalition of parties, esp in time of national emergency 
 
 non-algorithmic procedure — heuristic 
 
 non-uniform memory access — (architecture)   (NUMA) A memory architecture, used in multiprocessors, where the access time depends on the memory location. A processor can access its own local memory faster than non-local memory (memory which is local to another processor or shared between processors). 
 
 normal equivalent deviate — a value x such that the integral of a normal curve over all those values of the independent variable less than x is equal to the given probability. 
 
 own or similar occupation — A policyholder's own or similar occupation is the job that they were doing before they became disabled or a job with similar duties and training. 
 
 peripheral nervous system — the portion of the nervous system lying outside the brain and spinal cord. 
 
 permanent virtual circuit — (networking)   (PVC, or in ATM terminology, "Permanent Virtual Connection") A virtual circuit that is permanently established, saving the time associated with circuit establishment and tear-down. 
 
 personalized number plate — a car registration plate that has the owner's initials or name on it 
 
 pharmacotherapeutic group — Drugs and agents are categorized into pharmacotherapeutic groups based on which diseases they are designed to treat. 
 
 poacher turned gamekeeper — someone whose occupation or behaviour is the opposite of what it previously was, such as a burglar who now advises on home security 
 
 potassium sodium tartrate — a colorless or white, water-soluble solid, KNaC 4 H 4 O 6 ⋅4H 2 O, used in silvering mirrors, in the manufacture of Seidlitz powders and baking powder, and in medicine as a laxative. 
 
 primary producing country — a country that is involved in the extraction or winning of products consisting of raw materials, as in agriculture, fishing, forestry, hunting, or mining 
 
 property damage insurance — insurance against losses arising from damage to the property of others, as in a motor-vehicle accident. 
 
 put/set sb's mind at rest — To put someone's mind at rest or set their mind at rest means to tell them something that stops them worrying. 
 
 qualified majority voting — a voting system, used by the EU Council of Ministers, enabling certain resolutions to be passed without unanimity 
 
 rate monotonic scheduling — (algorithm)   A means of scheduling the time allocated to periodic hard-deadline real-time users of a resource. The users are assigned priorities such that a shorter fixed period between deadlines is associated with a higher priority. Rate monotonic scheduling provides a low-overhead, reasonably resource-efficient means of guaranteeing that all users will meet their deadlines provided that certain analytical equations are satisfied during the system design. It avoids the design complexity of time-line scheduling and the overhead of dynamic approaches such as earliest-deadline scheduling. 
 
 rotational quantum number — the quantum number that distinguishes the angular momentum states associated with the rotational motion of a molecule. 
 
 rubidium-strontium dating — a radiometric dating method whereby the ratio of rubidium isotope to strontium in a mineral is used to calculate the age of the mineral, based on the rate of radioactive decay of rubidium to strontium. 
 
 ruby-throated hummingbird — a small hummingbird, Archilochus colubris, the only hummingbird of eastern North America, having metallic-green upper plumage and a bright red throat in the male. 
 
 ruffle someone's feathers — one of the horny structures forming the principal covering of birds, consisting typically of a hard, tubular portion attached to the body and tapering into a thinner, stemlike portion bearing a series of slender, barbed processes that interlock to form a flat structure on each side. 
 
 run-time type information — (compiler)   (RTTI) Facilities included in C++ compilers to allow the type of an object to be determined at run time. This facility, found in good C++ compilers and some other high level languages, adds type information to memory resident objects (i.e. type name or unique type-id). This allows the run-time system to determine if an object is of a specific type, for example, to ensure that a cast of an object is valid. 
 
 saint pierre and miquelon — two small groups of islands off the S coast of Newfoundland: an overseas territory of France; important base for fishing. 3 sq. mi. (240 sq. km). Capital: St. Pierre. 
 
 sequential parlog machine — (SPM) The virtual machine (and its machine code) for the Parlog logic programming language. 
 
 single document interface — (programming)   (SDI) A limitation applying to an application program that only shows a single windows giving a view of one document at a time. The opposite is Multiple Document Interface (MDI). 
 
 strong accumulation point — a point such that every neighborhood of the point contains infinitely many points of a given set.