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Compass vs Orb - What's the difference?

compass | orb | Related terms |

Compass is a related term of orb.


As a noun compass

is a magnetic or electronic device used to determine the cardinal directions (usually magnetic or true north).

As a verb compass

is to surround; to encircle; to environ; to stretch round.

As an adverb compass

is (obsolete) in a circuit; round about.

As an initialism orb is

(software engineering).

compass

English

(wikipedia compass)

Noun

(es)
  • A magnetic or electronic device used to determine the cardinal directions (usually magnetic or true north).
  • * John Locke
    • He that first discovered the use of the compass did more for the supplying and increase of useful commodities than those who built workhouses.
  • A pair of compasses (a device used to draw an arc or circle).
  • * Jonathan Swift
    • to fix one foot of their compass wherever they please
  • (music) The range of notes of a musical instrument or voice.
  • * Shakespeare
    • You would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass .
  • (obsolete) A space within limits; area.
  • * 1763 , M. Le Page Du Pratz, History of Louisiana (PG), page 47:
    • In going up the Missisippi [sic] , we meet with nothing remarkable before we come to the Detour aux Anglois, the English Reach: in that part the river takes a large compass .
  • * Addison
    • Their wisdom lies in a very narrow compass .
  • * 1913 ,
    • Clara thought she had never seen him look so small and mean. He was as if trying to get himself into the smallest possible compass .
  • (obsolete) An enclosing limit; boundary; circumference.
    • within the compass of an encircling wall
  • Moderate bounds, limits of truth; moderation; due limits; used with within .
  • * Sir J. Davies
    • In two hundred years before (I speak within compass ), no such commission had been executed.
  • Scope.
  • * Wordsworth
    • the compass of his argument
  • * 1748 , David Hume, Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral , Oxford University Press (1973), section 8:
    • There is a truth and falsehood in all propositions on this subject, and a truth and falsehood, which lie not beyond the compass of human understanding.
  • * 1844 , (Edgar Allan Poe),
    • How very commonly we hear it remarked that such and such thoughts are beyond the compass of words! I do not believe that any thought, properly so called, is out of the reach of language.
  • (obsolete) A passing round; circuit; circuitous course.
  • * Bible, 2 Kings iii. 9
    • They fetched a compass of seven days' journey.
  • * Shakespeare
    • This day I breathed first; time is come round, / And where I did begin, there shall I end; / My life is run his compass .

    Synonyms

    * (magnetic direction finder) magnetic compass * (device used to draw circular curves) pair of compasses

    Hyponyms

    * (pair of compasses) beam compass

    Derived terms

    * beam compass * bow compass * compass card * compass error * compass needle * compass plant * compass point * compass rose * compass swing * gyrocompass * magnetic compass * mariner's compass * moral compass * pair of compasses * radio compass * telltale compass (pair of compasses) * beam compass

    Verb

    (es)
  • To surround; to encircle; to environ; to stretch round.
  • * 1610 , , by (William Shakespeare), act 5 scene 1
    • Now all the blessings
    Of a glad father compass thee about!
  • To go about or round entirely; to traverse.
  • (dated) To accomplish; to reach; to achieve; to obtain.
  • * 1763 , Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emilius; or, an essay on education , translated by M. Nugent, page 117:
    • [...] they never find ways sufficient to compass that end.
  • * 1816 , Catholicon: or, the Christian Philosopher , volume 3, from July to December 1816, page 56:
    • [...] to settle the end of our action or disputation; and then to take fit and effectual means to compass that end.
  • * 1857 , Gilbert Burnet, Bishop Burnet's History of His Own Time: from the Restoration of King Charles the Second to the Treaty of Peace at Utrecht in the Reign of Queen Anne , page 657:
    • [...] and was an artful flatterer, when that was necessary to compass his end, in which generally he was successful.
  • * 1921 November 23, The New Republic , volume 28, number 364, page 2:
    • The immediate problem is how to compass that end: by the seizure of territory or by the cultivation of the goodwill of the people whose business she seeks.
  • (dated) To plot; to scheme (against someone).
  • * 1600', ''The Arraignment and Judgement of Captain Thomas Lee'', published in '''1809 , by R. Bagshaw, in ''Cobbett's Complete Collection of State Trials , volume 1, page 1403–04:
    • That he plotted and compassed to raise Sedition and Rebellion [...]
  • * 1794' November 1, ''Speech of Mr. Erskine in Behalf of Hardy'', published in '''1884 , by Chauncey Allen Goodrich, in ''Select British Eloquence , page 719:
    • But it went beyond it by the loose construction of compassing to depose the King, [...]
  • * 1915 , The Wireless Age , volume 2, page 580:
    • The Bavarian felt a mad wave of desire for her sweep over him. What scheme wouldn't he compass to mould that girl to his wishes.

    Quotations

    * *: And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same is it that compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia.

    Synonyms

    * (surround) encircle, environ, surround * (go about or around entirely) cover, traverse * (accomplish) accomplish, achieve, attain, gain, get to, reach * conspire, plot, scheme

    Adverb

    (en adverb)
  • (obsolete) In a circuit; round about.
  • * 1658 , (w), Urne-Burial , Penguin (2005), ISBN 9780141023915, page 9:
    • Near the same plot of ground, for about six yards compasse were digged up coals and incinerated substances,

    References

    * *

    orb

    English

    Etymology 1

    (etyl) orbe, from (etyl) . Compare orbit .

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A spherical body; a globe; especially, one of the celestial spheres; a sun, planet, or star
    • In the small orb of one particular tear. --
    Whether the prime orb, Incredible how swift, had thither rolled. --
  • One of the azure transparent spheres conceived by the ancients to be inclosed one within another, and to carry the heavenly bodies in their revolutions
  • A circle; especially, a circle, or nearly circular orbit, described by the revolution of a heavenly body; an orbit
    • The schoolmen were like astronomers, which did feign eccentrics, and epicycles, and such engines of orbs. --Bacon
    You seem to me as Dian in her orb. --
    In orbs Of circuit inexpressible they stood, Orb within orb. --
  • (rare) A period of time marked off by the revolution of a heavenly body.
    • (John Milton)
  • (poetic) The eye, as luminous and spherical
    • A drop serene hath quenched their orbs. --
  • (poetic) A revolving circular body; a wheel
    • The orbs Of his fierce chariot rolled. --
  • (rare) A sphere of action.
    • (William Wordsworth)
    But in our orbs we'll live so round and safe. --
  • A globus cruciger
  • A translucent sphere appearing in flash photography
  • (military) A body of soldiers drawn up in a circle, as for defence, especially infantry to repel cavalry.

    • Verb

    (en verb)
  • (poetic) to form into an orb or circle
    • (Lowell)
    (Milton)
  • (poetic) to encircle; to surround; to enclose
  • * Addison
    • The wheels were orbed with gold.
  • (poetic) to become round like an orb

    • Etymology 2

    (etyl) .

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (architecture) A blank window or panel.

    • References

    *

    Anagrams

    * * * ----