This page gathers the 9,098 dictionary entries belonging to the domain “Engineering”, as labelled by Wiktionary. Each word leads to its full entry: definitions, etymology, pronunciation, examples. Page 63 of 91: from “pseudovalue” to “quiesce time”.
- pseudovalue noun Something that resembles a value but is not a true value or does not really belong to the set of data being studied.
- public key certificate noun A certificate that uses a digital signature to bind together a public key with an identity — used to verify that a public key belongs to a…
- publish verb To make (information such as an event) available to components that wish to be notified (subscribers).
- publisher noun A system or component that allows other components (subscribers) to receive notifications of something, such as an event.
- puck noun A pointing device with a crosshair.
- puddle ball noun A vaguely spherical lump of gloopy wrought iron taken from the puddling furnace, which gets hammered or rolled into shapes, such as a…
- puddling noun The first true industrial process to produce steel from pig iron.
- puffer noun A finite pattern that moves like a spaceship but leaves a trail of debris.
- pull verb To retrieve source code or other material from a source control repository.
- pull down noun A dynamic menu; a list of options in a computer application which appears below a heading when it is selected, and remains only as long as…
- pull out verb To transition from a dive to level or climbing flight.
- pull request noun A request to a repository maintainer to pull in and merge a proposed source code or other change.
- pull up verb To raise the nose of an aircraft.
- pull-down resistor noun A resistor that is connected between a signal and ground in a circuit to ensure that the signal is at a low logic level.
- pull-up resistor noun A resistor that is connected between a signal and a positive voltage supply in a circuit to ensure that the signal is at a defined logic…
- pullability noun The amount of change in frequency of a crystal oscillator in response to a change in load capacitance.
- pullback noun The limit of a cospan: a Cartesian square or “pullback square”.
- pulley noun One of the simple machines; a sheave, a wheel with a grooved rim, in which a pulled rope or chain lifts an object (more useful when two or…
- pullup noun A pull-up resistor.
- pulsator noun A component that beats or throbs while working.
- pulse verb To apply an electric current or signal that varies in strength to (something).
- pulse dialing noun A system of telephone dialing in which each digit is transmitted as the equivalent number of pulses.
- pulvino noun A structural element serving to distribute a load from a superimposed structure with higher mechanical resistance to a lower structure with…
- pump verb To pass (messages) into a program so that it can obey them.
- pumping lemma noun A lemma which states that for a language to be a member of a language class any sufficiently long string in the language contains a section…
- pumpking noun A Perl user working on shared source code who has been temporarily designated as the only person who is allowed to make changes.
- punch card noun Such a card, the size of a US dollar bill and having 80 columns of 12 rows, used in early mainframe computers.
- punch out verb To eject from an airplane.
- punchdown noun A kind of electrical connection often used in telephony, having solid copper wires that are punched down into short open-ended slots which…
- punched tape noun Synonym of paper tape (“an early sequential digital storage medium originally used with teletype machines, consisting of a long roll of…
- pup noun Acronym of potentially unwanted program, software that most computer users do not want on their computers, such as adware.
- puppet noun The upright support for the bearing of the spindle in a lathe.
- puppetize verb To configure (a system) using the Puppet software configuration management tool.
- pure adj Having no side effects.
- purple plague noun The brittle, bright-purple intermetallic compound AuAl₂, formed when gold and aluminium are heated while in direct contact (for instance…
- push noun The addition of a data item to the top of a stack.
- push notification noun The delivery of information from a software application to a computing device without a specific request from the client.
- push over verb To abruptly lower the nose of an aircraft by a large angle.
- push time noun The time when a remote server sends an unsolicited update.
- push-scrolling noun A form of scrolling that is triggered whenever the user's text cursor, player character, etc. approaches the border of the screen, so as to…
- pushalong noun A pattern that attaches to the front of a spaceship, moving along with it.
- pushback noun A procedure in which an aircraft is pushed backwards away from the gate by some external force, usually a special tractor.
- pushdown adj Describing a stack in which items are removed in a LIFO manner from the end at which they were added.
- pushdown automaton noun An automaton with finitely many states that can also use one unbounded stack of memory; the automaton may only push, pop, or read the top…
- pusher noun An aircraft with the propeller behind the fuselage.
- pushout noun The colimit of a pair of morphisms which share the same domain.
- pushrod noun A rod in a piston engine that actuates rocker arms above the cylinder head.
- put down verb Of an aircraft, to land.
- PWB noun printed wiring board - A circuit board blank created by etching away material thereby exposing non-conductive lands between conductive…
- pwd noun Abbreviation of password.
- pylon noun A tower-like structure, usually one of a series, used to support high-voltage electricity cables.
- pyramid of doom noun The presence of many levels of nested indentation in source code, making it difficult for a person to read.
- pyrogen noun Any substance characterized by great flammability, typically used to coat electric matches.
- Pythonesque adj Typical of, or suited to, the Python programming language.
- pythonic adj Using the idioms of the Python programming language.
- pythonist noun A programmer who uses the Python programming language.
- q noun Ellipsis of Q factor (“quality factor”).
- Q-learning noun A model-free reinforcement learning algorithm to learn a policy telling an agent what action to take under what circumstances.
- quad noun A group of four insulated wires twisted together to form two circuits of two wires each.
- quadball noun A rounded cube used to approximate a sphere.
- quadlet noun A word consisting of four bytes.
- quadratic time noun A time algorithm in which given an input of size n, the number of steps required to complete a task is the square of n.
- quadravigesimal noun A number system with base twenty-four, using the digits 0–9 and A–N (or Greek α-ω without numerals).
- quadricycle landing gear noun An aircraft undercarriage configuration featuring four main wheels of roughtly equal size, arranged in tandem pairs along the fuselage…
- quadripole noun An electrical circuit that has two pairs of external terminals.
- quadruple-click noun The action of pushing the button on a mouse four times in quick succession.
- quadword noun A numerical value of four times the magnitude of a word, typically used in the same contexts as the fossilized 16-bit sense of "word" and…
- quaject noun An object-like data structure containing both data and code (or pointers to code), typically used as an abstraction to manage…
- Quaker gun noun A nonfunctional imitation of a gun or an artillery piece, typically made of wood and usually intended to deceive enemy forces into…
- qualifier noun A marker that qualifies or modifies another code element.
- quality of life noun Features or improvements designed to make software easier to use without changing the main functionality.
- quality of service noun The overall performance of a telephony or computer network, based on error rates, throughput, transmission delay, etc.
- quantifier noun A symbol or symbols in a regular expression indicating the number of characters to be matched.
- quantization noun The process of approximating a continuous signal by a set of discrete symbols or integer values
- quantize verb To approximate a continuously varying signal by one whose amplitude can only have a set of discrete values
- quantum adj Relating to a quantum computer.
- quantum bogosort noun A hypothetical sorting algorithm which generates a random permutation of its input (like in bogosort) using a quantum source of entropy…
- quantum computing noun The use of quantum mechanical phenomena to transcend classical time complexity limitations in computing.
- quarantine noun An isolation of one program, drive, computer, etc. from the rest of a computer network to limit the damage from a bug, computer virus, etc.
- quark noun An integer that uniquely identifies a text string.
- quartering adj Coming from aft and to one side; having both a crosswind and tailwind component.
- quartz crystal noun A small crystal of quartz accurately cut in certain directions so that it can be vibrated at a particular frequency, to produce an electric…
- quasilinear adj Linearithmic.
- quasimode noun A mode that remains activated only through some constant action on the part of the user, such as holding down a certain key on the keyboard.
- quasiquote verb To enclose (a text fragment within source code) in a special markup that allows it to be separately parsed to yield a computed output value.
- quebibyte noun Strictly, 2¹⁰⁰ (1024¹⁰, 1,267,650,600,228,229,401,496,703,205,376) bytes or 2¹⁰ (1024) robibytes, as opposed to a quettabyte.
- quench verb To cool rapidly by direct contact with liquid coolant, as a blacksmith quenching hot iron.
- quenching noun The rapid cooling of a hot metal object, by placing it in a liquid, in order to harden it.
- query noun A set of instructions passed to a database.
- query language noun Any of several generalized computer languages in which users may extract data from selected records in a database.
- query processing noun Processing of a specific set of instructions for extracting particular data.
- queue noun A data structure in which objects are added to one end, called the tail, and removed from the other, called the head (in the case of a FIFO…
- queue up verb To enqueue (something): to add (it) to a queue.
- queuer noun A process, etc. that places data items on a queue.
- queuing noun The act of placing something in a queue.
- quiche-eater noun In computer programming circles, a person far removed from practice and concerned only with academic matters, unwilling to "get their hands…
- quick access recorder noun An airborne flight data recorder device specifically designed to facilitate the rapid and convenient retrieval of raw flight data for…
- quicksort noun A sorting algorithm that operates by recursively partitioning the items to be sorted into two sets.
- quiesce verb To pause or reduce the activity of (a device or application), for example to prepare it for backups or other maintenance.
- quiesce time noun The amount of time required to render a computer system inactive, or the amount of time between periods of inactivity.