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Supply vs Distribution - What's the difference?

supply | distribution |

As nouns the difference between supply and distribution

is that supply is (uncountable) the act of supplying while distribution is distribution.

As a verb supply

is to provide (something), to make (something) available for use.

As an adverb supply

is supplely: in a supple manner, with suppleness.

supply

English

(wikipedia supply)

Alternative forms

* supplely

Etymology 1

From (etyl) souploier, from (etyl) .

Verb

  • To provide (something), to make (something) available for use.
  • to supply money for the war
    (Prior)
  • To furnish or equip with.
  • to supply''' a furnace with fuel; to '''supply soldiers with ammunition
  • To fill up, or keep full.
  • Rivers are supplied by smaller streams.
  • To compensate for, or make up a deficiency of.
  • * 1881 , :
  • It was objected against him that he had never experienced love. Whereupon he arose, left the society, and made it a point not to return to it until he considered that he had supplied the defect.
  • To serve instead of; to take the place of.
  • * Waller
  • Burning ships the banished sun supply .
  • * Dryden
  • The sun was set, and Vesper, to supply / His absent beams, had lighted up the sky.
  • To act as a substitute.
  • To fill temporarily; to serve as substitute for another in, as a vacant place or office; to occupy; to have possession of.
  • to supply a pulpit
    Derived terms
    * supplier

    Noun

    (supplies)
  • (uncountable) The act of supplying.
  • supply and demand
  • (countable) An amount of something supplied.
  • A supply of good drinking water is essential.
  • (in the plural) provisions.
  • (mostly, in the plural) An amount of money provided, as by Parliament or Congress, to meet the annual national expenditures.
  • to vote supplies
  • Somebody, such as a teacher or clergyman, who temporarily fills the place of another; a substitute.
  • Derived terms
    * supply teacher

    Etymology 2

    Adverb

    (en adverb)
  • Supplely: in a supple manner, with suppleness.
  • * 1906 , Ford Madox Ford, The fifth queen: and how she came to court , page 68:
  • His voice was playful and full; his back was bent supply .
  • * 1938 , David Leslie Murray, Commander of the mists :
  • * 1963 , Johanna Moosdorf, Next door :
  • She swayed slightly in the gusts, bent supply to them and seemed at one with the force which Straup found so hostile.
  • * 1988 , ??????? ?????????????? ???????? (Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov), Quiet flows the Don (translated), volume 1, page 96:
  • Grigory hesitantly took her in his arms to kiss her, but she held him off, bent supply backwards and shot a frightened glance at the windows.
    'They'll see!'
    'Let them!'
    'I'd be ashamed—'

    distribution

    English

    Alternative forms

    *

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An act of distributing or state of being distributed.
  • An apportionment by law (of funds, property).
  • (business, marketing) The process by which goods get to final consumers over a geographical market, including storing, selling, shipping and advertising.
  • The frequency of occurrence or extent of existence.
  • Anything distributed; portion; share.
  • * Atterbury
  • our charitable distributions
  • The result of distributing; arrangement.
  • (mathematics, statistics) A probability distribution; the set of relative likelihoods that a variable will have a value in a given interval.
  • (computing) A set of bundled software components; distro.
  • (economics) The apportionment of income or wealth in a population.
  • The wealth distribution became extremely skewed in the kleptocracy.
  • (finance) The process or result of the sale of securities, especially their placement among investors with long-term investment strategies.
  • The resolution of a whole into its parts.
  • The process of sorting the types and placing them in their proper boxes in the cases.
  • The steps or operations by which steam is supplied to and withdrawn from the cylinder at each stroke of the piston: admission, suppression or cutting off, release or exhaust, and compression of exhaust steam prior to the next admission.
  • (lb)
  • * 1553', , ''The Arte of Rhetorique'' (1962), book iii, folio 99, page 209 ''s.v.'' “' Di?tribucion ”:
  • It is al?o called a di?tribucion , when we diuide the whole, into ?euerall partes, and ?aie we haue foure poynctes, whereof we purpo?e to ?peake, comp?ehendyng our whole talke within compa??e of the?ame.
  • * 1728', (Ephraim Chambers), '''' I, page 230/2 ''s.v.'' “' Di?tribution ²”:
  • Di?tribution, in Rhetoric, a Kind of De?cription ; or a Figure, whereby an orderly Divi?ion, and Enumeration is made of the principal Qualities of a Subject.

    Derived terms

    (Derived terms) * distributional * distributionism * frequency distribution * income distribution * multidistribution * property distribution * stable distribution * probability distribution * tempered distribution

    References

    * “ Distribution]” on page 534 of § 1 (D, ed. ) of volume III (D–E, 1897) of [[w:Oxford English Dictionary, A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles] (1st ed.)