20-letter words containing s, a, n, t, o
- raise one's glass to — to drink the health of; drink a toast to
- real-time processing — data-processing by a computer which receives constantly changing data, such as information relating to air-traffic control, travel booking systems, etc, and processes it sufficiently rapidly to be able to control the source of the data
- receivables turnover — A receivables turnover is a measure of cash flow that is calculated by dividing net credit sales by average accounts receivable.
- recommended standard — (standard) (RS) A series of EIA standards including EIA-232.
- refracting telescope — an optical instrument for making distant objects appear larger and therefore nearer. One of the two principal forms (refracting telescope) consists essentially of an objective lens set into one end of a tube and an adjustable eyepiece or combination of lenses set into the other end of a tube that slides into the first and through which the enlarged object is viewed directly; the other form (reflecting telescope) has a concave mirror that gathers light from the object and focuses it into an adjustable eyepiece or combination of lenses through which the reflection of the object is enlarged and viewed. Compare radio telescope.
- refuse disposal unit — a unit or part of a sink that disposes of waste food, etc, by grinding
- reservations manager — A reservations manager at a hotel is responsible for the reservations at the hotel.
- respiratory quotient — the ratio of the amount of carbon dioxide released by the lungs to the amount of oxygen taken in during a given period.
- restriction fragment — a length of DNA cut from the strand by a restriction enzyme.
- restrictive covenant — a covenant with a clause that restricts the action of any party to it, especially an agreement among property owners not to sell to members of particular minority groups.
- retinitis pigmentosa — degeneration of the retina manifested by night blindness and gradual loss of peripheral vision, eventually resulting in tunnel vision or total blindness.
- return on net assets — the amount of profit computed by dividing net income before interest and taxes by the cost of net assets, usually expressed as a percentage. Abbreviation: RONA.
- reversionary annuity — an annuity payable to a beneficiary during the period of time he or she survives the insured.
- rise to the occasion — to have the courage, wit, etc, to meet the special demands of a situation
- rocky mountain basic — (language) The BASIC language used by Hewlett Packard on their 680x0-based computers. Rocky Mountain Basic is good for interfaces to IEEE 488 controls and contains many mathematical and matrix functions. It has about 600 commands. Typical applications include automatic test stations.
- rocky mountain sheep — bighorn.
- rotations per minute — revolutions per minute
- royal british legion — an organization founded in 1921 to provide services and assistance for former members of the armed forces
- royal leamington spa — a city in Warwickshire, central England: health resort.
- saint andrew's cross — a low evergreen shrub, Ascyrum hypericoides, native to temperate and subtropical America, having flowers in clusters of three: often cultivated.
- saint anthony's fire — any of certain skin conditions that are of an inflammatory or gangrenous nature, as erysipelas, hospital gangrene, or ergotism.
- saint george's cross — the Greek cross as used in the flag of Great Britain.
- saint john ambulance — an organization that provides first aid and first-aid training
- saint thomas aquinas — Saint, Aquinas, Saint Thomas.
- santa cruz operation — (SCO) A supplier of Unix systems for Intel microprocessors. They supply Xenix and Open Desktop. Founded in 1979, SCO became a public company in May, 1993 and trades on the Nasdaq National Market System under the symbol SCOC. SCO maintains its world headquarters in Santa Cruz, California, USA; a European headquarters in Watford, England; a Government Systems Group in Reston, Virginia; and offices in Asia, Australia, Canada, Latin America, and throughout Europe and the United States. In February 1993, SCO acquired IXI Limited of Cambridge, England, the leading supplier of Unix System windowing software.
- satellite navigation — navigation using data received from satellites
- satellite television — television transmitted from an artificial satellite at a power suitable for direct reception in the home
- scatter site housing — public housing, especially for low-income families, built throughout an urban area rather than being concentrated in a single neighborhood.
- schizoid personality — sb with identity disorder
- schrodinger equation — the wave equation of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics. Also called Schrödinger wave equation. Compare wave equation (def 2).
- scientific socialism — Marxist socialism
- scottish nationalism — a political ideology advocating the independence of Scotland
- season ticket holder — a person who has a season ticket
- second international — an international association formed in 1889 in Paris, uniting socialistic groups or parties of various countries and holding international congresses from time to time: in 1923 it joined with the Vienna International to form the Labor and Socialist International. Compare international (def 6).
- second law of motion — any of three laws of classical mechanics, either the law that a body remains at rest or in motion with a constant velocity unless an external force acts on the body (first law of motion) the law that the sum of the forces acting on a body is equal to the product of the mass of the body and the acceleration produced by the forces, with motion in the direction of the resultant of the forces (second law of motion) or the law that for every force acting on a body, the body exerts a force having equal magnitude and the opposite direction along the same line of action as the original force (third law of motion or law of action and reaction)
- second-class citizen — a citizen, especially a member of a minority group, who is denied the social, political, and economic benefits of citizenship.
- secure accommodation — an institution where young offenders are kept in custody
- security association — (networking) The relationship between two or more entities (typically, a computer, but could be a user on a computer, or software component) which describes how the entities will use security services, such as encryption, to communicate. See RFC 1825.
- senior aircraftwoman — a rank in the Royal Air Force comparable to that of a private in the army, though not the lowest rank in the Royal Air Force
- separation allowance — an allowance paid to a member of the military when they are forced to be apart from their family due to their military duties
- separation of powers — the principle or system of vesting in separate branches the executive, legislative, and judicial powers of a government.
- serve a person right — to pay a person back, esp for wrongful or foolish treatment or behaviour
- service access point — (networking) (SAP) The OSI term for the component of a network address which identifies the individual application on a host which is sending or receiving a packet. Different SAPs distinguish between different services or applications on a host, e.g. electronic mail, FTP, HTTP.
- set the ball rolling — to open or initiate (an action, discussion, movement, etc)
- settle accounts with — to pay or receive a balance due
- sex change operation — a surgical operation designed to change a person's physical sexual characteristics to those of the opposite sex
- shakespearean sonnet — a sonnet form used by Shakespeare and having the rhyme scheme abab, cdcd, efef, gg.
- shank of the evening — the latter part of the afternoon
- shear transformation — a map of a coordinate space in which one coordinate is held fixed and the other coordinate or coordinates are shifted.
- shifting cultivation — a land-use system, esp in tropical Africa, in which a tract of land is cultivated until its fertility diminishes, when it is abandoned until this is restored naturally