0%

21-letter words containing s, i, m, e, t, h

  • law of thermodynamics — any of three principles variously stated in equivalent forms, being the principle that the change of energy of a thermodynamic system is equal to the heat transferred minus the work done (first law of thermodynamics) the principle that no cyclic process is possible in which heat is absorbed from a reservoir at a single temperature and converted completely into mechanical work (second law of thermodynamics) and the principle that it is impossible to reduce the temperature of a system to absolute zero in a finite number of operations (third law of thermodynamics)
  • macintosh file system — (file system)   A file on the Macintosh consists of two parts, called forks. The "data fork" contains the data which would normally be stored in the file on other operating systems. The "resource fork" contains a collection of arbitrary attribute/value pairs, including program segments, icon bitmaps, and parametric values. Yet more information regarding Macintosh files is stored by the Finder in a hidden file, called the "Desktop Database". Because of the complications in storing different parts of a Macintosh file in non-Macintosh file systems that only handle consecutive data in one part, it is common to only send the Data fork or to convert the Macintosh file into some other format before transferring it.
  • maidenhair spleenwort — an evergreen fern, Asplenium trichomanes, abundant in woody areas of the North Temperate Zone, having thickly clustered fronds.
  • main-topsail schooner — a two-masted or three-masted schooner having square topsails on the foremast and mainmast: a jackass brig or jackass bark.
  • majority shareholding — a holding of more than half a company's shares
  • make one's peace with — the normal, nonwarring condition of a nation, group of nations, or the world.
  • mauvais quart d'heure — a brief unpleasant experience
  • mechanical instrument — a musical instrument, such as a barrel organ or music box, that plays a preselected piece of music by mechanical means
  • mechanical solidarity — social cohesiveness that is based on shared activities, beliefs, and experiences and is characteristic of simple traditional societies.
  • mengistu haile mariam — born 1937, Ethiopian political leader: head of state 1977–87; president 1987–91.
  • methylisothiazolinone — (chemistry) A powerful biocide and preservative within the group of isothiazolinones, used in shampoos etc.
  • minister of the crown — any Government minister of cabinet rank
  • mistress of the robes — (in Britain) a lady of high rank in charge of the Queen's wardrobe
  • modern apprenticeship — an arrangement that allows a school leaver to gain vocational qualifications while being trained in a job
  • motherwell and wishaw — a burgh in the Motherwell district, in S Scotland.
  • motivational research — the application of the knowledge and techniques of the social sciences, especially psychology and sociology, to understanding consumer attitudes and behavior: used as a guide in advertising and marketing.
  • multichannel analyser — an electronic instrument, such as a pulse height analyser, that splits an input waveform into a large number of channels in accordance with a particular parameter of the input
  • night-blooming cereus — any of various cacti of the genera Hylocereus, Peniocereus, Nyctocereus, or Selenicereus, having large, usually white flowers that open at night.
  • nightmare file system — Pejorative hackerism for Sun's Network File System (NFS). In any nontrivial network of Suns where there is a lot of NFS cross-mounting, when one Sun goes down, the others often freeze up. Some machine tries to access the down one, and (getting no response) repeats indefinitely. This causes it to appear dead to some messages (what is actually happening is that it is locked up in what should have been a brief excursion to a higher spl level). Then another machine tries to reach either the down machine or the pseudo-down machine, and itself becomes pseudo-down. The first machine to discover the down one is now trying both to access the down one and to respond to the pseudo-down one, so it is even harder to reach. This situation snowballs very quickly, and soon the entire network of machines is frozen - worst of all, the user can't even abort the file access that started the problem! Many of NFS's problems are excused by partisans as being an inevitable result of its statelessness, which is held to be a great feature (critics, of course, call it a great misfeature). ITS partisans are apt to cite this as proof of Unix's alleged bogosity; ITS had a working NFS-like shared file system with none of these problems in the early 1970s. See also broadcast storm.
  • no smoke without fire — the evidence strongly suggests something has indeed happened
  • northumberland strait — the part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence that separates Prince Edward Island from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, in SE Canada. About 200 miles (320 km) long; 9–30 miles (15–48 km) wide.
  • peephole optimisation — (compiler)   A kind of low-level code optimisation that considers only a few adjacent machine code instructions at a time and looks for certain combinations which can be replaced with more efficient sequences. E.g. ADD R0, #1 ADD R0, #1 (add one to register R0) could be replaced by ADD R0, #2 as long as there were no jumps to the second instruction.
  • potassium diphosphate — any of the three orthophosphates of potassium ((potassium monophosphate) (K 2 HPO 4), (potassium diphosphate) (KH 2 PO 4), and (tripotassium phosphate) (K 3 PO 4) )
  • potassium thiocyanate — a colorless, crystalline, hygroscopic, water-soluble solid, KSCN, used chiefly in the manufacture of chemicals, dyes, and drugs.
  • primary sex character — any of the body structures directly concerned in reproduction, as the testes, ovaries, and external genitalia.
  • profit-sharing scheme — a scheme employing profit-sharing; a system in which a portion of the net profit of a business is distributed to its employees, usually in proportion to their wages or their length of service
  • pseudohermaphroditism — an individual having internal reproductive organs of one sex and external sexual characteristics resembling those of the other sex or being ambiguous in nature. Compare hermaphrodite (def 1).
  • purchasing department — the group of staff within an organization that is responsible for buying goods or products
  • put something over on — to deceive; trick
  • queer someone's pitch — to upset someone's plans
  • s-k reduction machine — An abstract machine defined by Professor David Turner to evaluate combinator expressions represented as binary graphs. Named after the two basic combinators, S and K.
  • salam-weinberg theory — the electroweak theory.
  • sb/sth reigns supreme — Someone or something that reigns supreme is the most important or powerful element in a situation or period of time.
  • schema definition set — (SDS) Something in Portable Common Tool Environment.
  • sealed-beam headlight — a headlight in which the reflector and lens are hermetically sealed together with the filament in a single unit.
  • secure hash algorithm —
  • sherman antitrust act — an act of Congress (1890) prohibiting any contract, conspiracy, or combination of business interests in restraint of foreign or interstate trade.
  • short message service — (messaging)   (SMS) A message service offered by the GSM digital mobile telephone system. Using SMS, a short alphanumeric message (160 alphanumeric characters) can be sent to a mobile phone to be displayed there, much like in an alphanumeric pager system. The message is buffered by the GSM network until the phone becomes active.
  • siamese fighting fish — a labyrinth fish, Betta splendens, that has been bred for centuries to develop brilliant coloration, very long fins, and pugnacity.
  • sick to one's stomach — afflicted with ill health or disease; ailing.
  • slatwall merchandiser — A slatwall merchandiser is a three-dimensional display unit with grooves cut into its surface into which metal hanging rails can be fixed at various heights.
  • sodium metabisulphite — an inorganic compound with the chemical formula Na2S2O5 that is used as a preservative, antioxidant and disinfectant
  • somatotrophic-hormone — a hormone secreted by the anterior pituitary gland, that stimulates growth in humans.
  • something for nothing — If you say that someone is getting something for nothing, you disapprove of the fact that they are getting what they want without doing or giving anything in return.
  • splice the main brace — to join together or unite (two ropes or parts of a rope) by the interweaving of strands.
  • statistical mechanics — the science that deals with average properties of the molecules, atoms, or elementary particles in random motion in a system of many such particles and relates these properties to the thermodynamic and other macroscopic properties of the system.
  • swim against the tide — to resist prevailing opinion
  • sympathetic vibration — a vibration induced by resonance.
  • symphonie fantastique — a programmatic symphony (1830–31) in five movements by Hector Berlioz.
  • the executive mansion — the White House
Was this page helpful?
Yes No
Thank you for your feedback! Tell your friends about this page
Tell us why?