27-letter words containing s, t, e, n, o, r
- to know something backwards — In British English, if you say that someone knows something backwards, you are emphasizing that they know it very well. In American English, you say that someone knows something backward and forward.
- to rub someone's nose in it — To rub someone's nose in something that they do not want to think about, such as a failing or a mistake they have made, means to remind them repeatedly about it.
- to rule sb with a high hand — to behave imperiously towards someone
- to run counter to something — If one thing runs counter to another, or if one thing is counter to another, the first thing is the opposite of the second thing or conflicts with it.
- to run rings around someone — If you say that someone runs rings round you or runs rings around you, you mean that they are a lot better or a lot more successful than you at a particular activity.
- to send someone to coventry — If people send you to Coventry, they avoid speaking to you whenever they meet you, as a way of punishing you for something that you have done.
- to steal a march on someone — If you steal a march on someone, you start doing something before they do it in order to gain an advantage over them.
- to stop dead in your tracks — If someone or something stops you in your tracks, or if you stop dead in your tracks, you suddenly stop moving because you are very surprised, impressed, or frightened.
- to take someone by surprise — If something takes you by surprise, it happens when you are not expecting it or when you are not prepared for it.
- to throw money at something — If you say that someone is throwing money at a problem, you are critical of them for trying to improve it by spending money on it, instead of doing more thoughtful and practical things to improve it.
- united nations organization — the United Nations. Abbreviation: UNO, U.N.O.
- united service organization — a private, non-profit organization that provides morale and recreational services to members of the US military, with programmes in 140 centres worldwide
- universal computer protocol — (communications, protocol) An earlier form of External Machine Interface (EMI).
- universal naming convention — (networking) (UNC) The type of file system path used in Microsoft Windows networking to completely specify a directory on a file server. The basic format is: \\servername\sharename where "servername" is the hostname or IP address of a network file server, and "sharename" is the name of a shared directory on the server. This is related to the conventional MS-DOS "C:\windows" style of directory name. E.g. \\server1\dave might be set up to point to C:\users\homedirs\dave on a server called "server1". It is possible to execute a program using this convention without having to specifically link a drive, by running: \\server\share\directory\program.exe The undocumented DOS command, TRUENAME can be used to find out the UNC name of a file or directory on a network drive. Even Microsoft don't know whether UNC stands for "Universal Naming Convention" or "Uniform Naming Convention", both appear on their website, sometimes withing the same document, but with a preference for "Universal".
- university grants committee — an advisory committee of the British government, which advised on the distribution of grant funding amongst British universities. It was in existence from 1919 until 1989. Its functions have now largely been taken over by the higher education funding councils (HEFCE (England), SHEFC (Scotland), HEFCW (Wales), and the Department for Employment and Learning in Northern Ireland)
- weapons of mass destruction — nuclear, biological and chemical arms
- western digital corporation — (company) A company founded in 1970 as a specialised semiconductor manufacturer, which today manufactures and sells microcomputer products including small form factor hard disk drives for personal computers, integrated circuits and circuit boards for graphics, storage, communications, battery management, and logic functions.
- wipe the floor with someone — If you wipe the floor with someone, you defeat them completely in a competition or discussion.
- wireless local area network — a wireless broadband system for linking personal computers and workstations with each other in order to share data, devices, programs, etc.: usually confined to one office, building, or home.
- working families tax credit — (in Britain) a means-tested allowance paid to single parents or families who have at least one dependent child, who work at least 16 hours per week, and whose earnings are low. It replaced family credit