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23-letter words containing s, c

  • castellammare di stabia — a port and resort in SW Italy, in Campania on the Bay of Naples: site of the Roman resort of Stabiae, which was destroyed by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 ad. Pop: 66 929 (2001)
  • catch someone off guard — If someone catches you off guard, they surprise you by doing something you do not expect. If something catches you off guard, it surprises you by happening when you are not expecting it.
  • caught in the crossfire — If you are caught in the crossfire, you become involved in an unpleasant situation in which people are arguing with each other, although you do not want to be involved or say which person you agree with.
  • central processing unit — the part of a computer that performs logical and arithmetical operations on the data as specified in the instructions
  • certificate of registry — a document issued to a U.S. vessel engaged in foreign trade, stating its name, nationality, ownership, etc., and claiming for it all privileges pertaining to U.S. nationality.
  • character assassination — A character assassination is a deliberate attempt to destroy someone's reputation, especially by criticizing them in an unfair and dishonest way when they are not present.
  • characteristic equation — Mathematics. the characteristic polynomial of a given matrix, equated to zero. Also called auxiliary equation. an equation with one variable and equated to zero, which is derived from a given linear differential equation and in which the coefficient and power of the variable in each term correspond to the coefficient and order of a derivative in the original equation.
  • characteristic function — a function that assigns the value 1 to the members of a given set and the value 0 to its nonmembers
  • characteristic velocity — a measure of the effectiveness with which the combustion in a rocket engine produces high temperature and pressure, equal to the exhaust velocity divided by the thrust coefficient.
  • cheyne-stokes breathing — alternating shallow and deep breathing, as in comatose patients
  • chi-square distribution — a continuous single-parameter distribution derived as a special case of the gamma distribution and used esp to measure goodness of fit and to test hypotheses and obtain confidence intervals for the variance of a normally distributed variable
  • chinese trumpet creeper — a showy, woody vine, Campsis grandiflora, of China, having aerial rootlets and large red flowers.
  • chronic wasting disease — a disease found among members of the deer family, a type of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy
  • church of the subgenius — (body, humour)   A mutant offshoot of Discordianism launched in 1981 as a spoof of fundamentalist Christianity by the "Reverend" Ivan Stang, a brilliant satirist with a gift for promotion. Popular among hackers as a rich source of bizarre imagery and references such as "Bob" the divine drilling-equipment salesman, the Benevolent Space Xists, and the Stark Fist of Removal. Much SubGenius theory is concerned with the acquisition of the mystical substance or quality of slack.
  • circumstantial evidence — indirect evidence that tends to establish a conclusion by inference
  • citizens' advice bureau — an independent charity where the public can obtain free, confidential information and advice on an extensive range of civil, consumer, and legal matters
  • citrus greening disease — Plant Pathology. a bacterial disease of citrus trees, transmitted by insects of the Psyllidae family.
  • civil aeronautics board — the former federal agency (1938–85) that regulated airline fares and assigned routes. Abbreviation: CAB, C.A.B.
  • classification schedule — the printed scheme of a system of classification
  • collision damage waiver — a form of optional collision insurance cover for a vehicle that is being rented
  • columbus air force base — U.S. Air Force installation in NE Mississippi, NW of Columbus.
  • combinatorial chemistry — the use of chemical methods to generate all possible combinations of chemicals
  • come apart at the seams — come unstitched
  • come into one's/its own — If someone or something comes into their own, they become very successful or start to perform very well because the circumstances are right.
  • come out of one's shell — to become less shy and reserved
  • come to one's knowledge — to become known to one
  • come to sb's assistance — If you come to someone's assistance, you take action to help them.
  • common lisp in parallel — (language, parallel)   (CLIP) A version of Common LISP from Allegro for the Sequent Symmetry.
  • commonwealth of nations — a voluntary association of independent nations and dependent territories linked by historical ties (as parts of the former British Empire) and cooperating on matters of mutual concern, especially regarding economics and trade.
  • communications software — (communications, software)   Application programs, operating system components, and probably firmware, forming part of a communication system. These different software components might be classified according to the functions within the Open Systems Interconnect model which they provide. Typical applications include a web browser, Mail User Agent, chat and telnet.
  • communist international — Third International.
  • communist-international — an international organization (1919–43), founded in Moscow, uniting Communist groups of various countries and advocating the attainment of their ends by violent revolution. Also called Comintern, Communist International. Compare international (def 6).
  • community-service order — (in Britain) a court order requiring an offender over seventeen years old to do unpaid socially beneficial work under supervision instead of going to prison
  • compact disc read-write — Compact Disc Rewritable
  • compact disc recordable — (storage)   (CD-R) A write-once version of CD-ROM. CD-Rs can hold about 650 megabytes of data. They are very durable and can be read by normal CD-ROM drives, but once data has been written it cannot be altered. Standard prerecorded CDs have their information permanently stamped into an aluminium reflecting layer. CD-R discs have a dye-based recording layer and an additional golden reflecting layer. Digital information is written to the disc by burning (forming) pits in the recording layer in a pattern corresponding to that of a conventional CD. The laser beam heats the substrate and recording layer to approximately 250 C. The recording layer melts and the substrate expands into the space that becomes available. See also CD-RW and DVD-RAM.
  • compact disc rewritable — (storage)   (CD-RW) A rewritable version of CD-ROM. A CD-RW drive can write about 650 megabytes of data to CD-RW media an unlimited number of times. Most CD-RW drives can also write once to CD-R media. CD-RW media cannot be read by CD-ROM drives built prior to 1997 due to the reduced reflectivity (15% compared to 70%) of CD-RW media. CD-RW drives and media are currently (1999) more expensive than CD-R drives and media. CD-R is sometimes considered a better technology for archival purposes as the data cannot be accidentally modified or tampered with, and encourages better archival practices. Standard prerecorded CDs have their information permanently stamped into an aluminium reflecting layer. CD-WR discs have a phase-change recording layer and an additional silver (aluminium) reflecting layer. A laser beam can melt crystals in the recording layer into a non-crystalline amorphous phase or anneal them slowly at a lower temperature back to the crystalline state. The different reflectance of the areas make them appear as the 'pits' and 'lands' of a standard CD. See also CD-R and DVD-RAM.
  • comparative advertising — a form of advertising in which a product is compared favourably with similar products on the market
  • comparative linguistics — the study of the correspondences between languages that have a common origin.
  • completely normal space — a normal topological space in which every subspace is normal.
  • composite colour signal — a colour television signal in which luminance and two chrominance components are encoded into a single signal
  • computer-based training — Computer-Aided Instruction
  • concertgebouw orchestra — an Amsterdam orchestra, established in 1888, that has been independent of the Concertgebouw hall since World War II
  • concrete data structure — (theory)   (CDS) A model of programming language terms developed in the context of constructing fully abstract semantics for sequential languages. A CDS is a 4-tuple (C,V,E,|-) where C is a cell, V is a value, E is an event and |- is an "enabling relation". An event is a cell and a value. A cell C is "enabled" by a set of events S if S |- C. A state is a set of events which are consistent in that the values they give for any cell are all equal. Every cell in a state is enabled.
  • condition code register — a hardware register used for storing the current values of the condition codes
  • conditioned suppression — the reduction in the frequency of a learned response, e.g. pressing a bar for water, that occurs when a stimulus previously associated with pain is present
  • confessional television — television programmes, esp talk shows, in which members of the public reveal their private lives, personal problems, etc
  • conformational analysis — the study of the spatial arrangement of atoms or groups of atoms in a molecule and the way in which this influences chemical behaviour
  • connection machine lisp — (language)   Lisp with a parallel data structure, the 'xapping', an array of values assigned to an array of sites.
  • connectionless protocol — (protocol)   The data communication method in which communication occurs between hosts with no previous setup. Packets sent between two hosts may take different routes.
  • conscientious objection — refusal on moral or religious grounds to serve in the armed forces or to bear arms in a military conflict.
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