13-letter words containing w, a, i, l
- digital watch — a watch that displays the time in numerical digits rather than by hands on a dial.
- disallowances — Plural form of disallowance.
- downhill race — a competitive event in which skiers are timed in a downhill run
- draw the line — a mark or stroke long in proportion to its breadth, made with a pen, pencil, tool, etc., on a surface: a line down the middle of the page.
- drawing table — a table having a surface consisting of a drawing board adjustable to various heights and angles.
- early warning — An early warning system warns people that something bad is likely to happen, for example that a machine is about to stop working, or that a country is being attacked.
- fairy swallow — a variety of domestic fancy pigeon having blue-and-white plumage and heavily muffed feet
- family jewels — a man's genitals
- father-in-law — the father of one's husband or wife.
- fellow inmate — sb in same prison
- field sparrow — a common North American finch, Spizella pusilla, found in brushy pasturelands.
- finagle's law — (humour) The generalised or "folk" version of Murphy's Law, fully named "Finagle's Law of Dynamic Negatives" and usually rendered "Anything that can go wrong, will". One variant favoured among hackers is "The perversity of the Universe tends toward a maximum". The label "Finagle's Law" was popularised by SF author Larry Niven in several stories depicting a frontier culture of asteroid miners; this "Belter" culture professed a religion and/or running joke involving the worship of the dread god Finagle and his mad prophet Murphy.
- final whistle — sport: whistle indicating end of match
- finback whale — rorqual
- firewall code — 1. The code you put in a system (say, a telephone switch) to make sure that the users can't do any damage. Since users always want to be able to do everything but never want to suffer for any mistakes, the construction of a firewall is a question not only of defensive coding but also of interface presentation, so that users don't even get curious about those corners of a system where they can burn themselves. 2. Any sanity check inserted to catch a can't happen error. Wise programmers often change code to fix a bug twice: once to fix the bug, and once to insert a firewall which would have arrested the bug before it did quite as much damage.
- flaming sword — a cultivated bromeliad, Vriesea splendens, native to French Guiana, having long, red bracts and yellow flowers.
- flaminian way — an ancient Roman road extending N from Rome to what is now Rimini. 215 miles (345 km) long.
- flowering ash — a variety of ash tree that produces conspicuous flowers
- formal review — (project) A technical review conducted with the customer including the types of reviews called for in DOD-STD-2167A (Preliminary Design Review, Critical Design Review, etc.)
- foxtail wedge — a wedge in the split end of a tenon, bolt, or the like, for spreading and securing it when driven into a blind mortise or hole.
- frank whittle — Sir Frank, 1907–96, English engineer and inventor.
- fusarium wilt — a disease of plants, characterized by damping-off, wilting, and a brown dry rot, caused by fungi of the genus Fusarium.
- gabrilowitsch — Ossip [aw-syip] /ˈɔ syɪp/ (Show IPA), 1878–1936, Russian pianist and conductor, in America.
- genital warts — a sexually transmitted disease caused by the human papilloma virus; the warts grow in the genital area
- girl-watching — the activity of looking at young women to enjoy their attractiveness, perhaps with a view to starting a relationship
- glass-blowing — the art or process of forming or shaping a mass of molten or heat-softened glass into ware by blowing air into it through a tube.
- go along with — permit, consent to
- guerrilla war — a war between an established army and a guerrilla group
- hardwick hall — an Elizabethan mansion near Chesterfield in Derbyshire: built 1591–97 for Elizabeth, Countess of Shrewsbury (Bess of Hardwick)
- high-low-jack — all fours (def 2).
- hubli-dharwad — a city in Karnataka, SW India: the union of two cities, Hubli and Dharwar.
- hubli-dharwar — city in SW India: pop. 648,000
- ideal gas law — the law that the product of the pressure and the volume of one gram molecule of an ideal gas is equal to the product of the absolute temperature of the gas and the universal gas constant.
- indecency law — the law relating to indecency
- indian mallow — Also called velvetleaf. an Asian plant, Abutilon theophrasti, of the mallow family, having velvety leaves and yellow flowers: it is cultivated in China for its jutelike fiber and has become naturalized as a weed in North America.
- indian yellow — Also called purree, snowshoe. an orange-yellow color.
- isolated pawn — a pawn without pawns of the same colour on neighbouring files
- jigsaw puzzle — Also called picture puzzle. a set of irregularly cut pieces of pasteboard, wood, or the like that form a picture or design when fitted together.
- kerb-crawling — Kerb-crawling is the activity of driving slowly along the side of a road in order to find and hire a prostitute.
- kilowatt-hour — a unit of energy, equivalent to the energy transferred or expended in one hour by one kilowatt of power; approximately 1.34 horsepower-hours. Abbreviation: kWh, K.W.H., kwhr.
- lake dwelling — a house, especially of prehistoric times, built on piles or other support over the water of a lake.
- lake winnipeg — a lake in S Canada, in Manitoba: drains through the Nelson River into Hudson Bay. Area: 23 553 sq km (9094 sq miles)
- lancet window — a high, narrow window terminating in a lancet arch.
- landownership — an owner or proprietor of land.
- launch window — a precise time period during which a spacecraft can be launched from a particular site in order to achieve a desired mission, as a rendezvous with another spacecraft.
- 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)
- law stationer — a stationer selling articles used by lawyers
- leibniz's law — the principle that two expressions satisfy exactly the same predicates if and only if they both refer to the same subject
- light railway — a transport system using small trains or trams, often serving parts of a large metropolitan area
- low-bandwidth — [communication theory] Used to indicate a talk that, although not content-free, was not terribly informative. "That was a low-bandwidth talk, but what can you expect for an audience of suits!" Compare zero-content, bandwidth, math-out.