bridge vs span

bridge

verb
  • To span as if with a bridge. 

  • To employ the bridge tactic. (See Noun section.) 

  • To be or make a bridge over something. 

  • To transition from one piece or section of music to another without stopping. 

  • To go to the bridge position. 

  • To connect two or more computer buses, networks etc. with a bridge. 

noun
  • An edge which, if removed, changes a connected graph to one that is not connected. 

  • A software component connecting two or more separate systems. 

  • A prosthesis replacing one or several adjacent teeth. 

  • A construction spanning a waterway, ravine, or valley from an elevated height, allowing for the passage of vehicles, pedestrians, trains, etc. 

  • A similar position in gymnastics. 

  • A card game played with four players playing as two teams of two players each. 

  • A particular form of one hand placed on the table to support the cue when making a shot in cue sports. 

  • A solid crust of undissolved salt in a water softener. 

  • A cue modified with a convex arch-shaped notched head attached to the narrow end, used to support a player's (shooter's) cue for extended or tedious shots. Also called a spider. 

  • The situation where a lone rider or small group of riders closes the space between them and the rider or group in front. 

  • An elongated chain of teammates, connected to the pack, for improved blocking potential. 

  • The upper bony ridge of the human nose. 

  • An elevated platform above the upper deck of a mechanically propelled ship from which it is navigated and from which all activities on deck can be seen and controlled by the captain, etc; smaller ships have a wheelhouse, and sailing ships were controlled from a quarterdeck. 

  • A defensive position in which the wrestler is supported by his feet and head, belly-up, in order to prevent touch-down of the shoulders and eventually to dislodge an opponent who has established a position on top. 

  • A contrasting section within a song that prepares for the return of the original material section. 

  • The gap between the holes on a bowling ball 

  • A point in a line where a break in a word unit cannot occur. 

  • Anything supported at the ends and serving to keep some other thing from resting upon the object spanned, as in engraving, watchmaking, etc., or which forms a platform or staging over which something passes or is conveyed. 

  • Any of several electrical devices that measure characteristics such as impedance and inductance by balancing different parts of a circuit 

  • A connection, real or abstract. 

  • An unintended solder connection between two or more components or pins. 

  • A device which connects two or more computer buses, typically in a transparent manner. 

  • A statement, such as an offer, that signals a possibility of accord. 

  • The piece, on string instruments, that supports the strings from the sounding board. 

  • A rudimentary procedure before definite solution 

  • A low wall or vertical partition in the fire chamber of a furnace, for deflecting flame, etc.; a bridge wall. 

  • An intramolecular valence bond, atom or chain of atoms that connects two different parts of a molecule; the atoms so connected being bridgeheads. 

  • A system which connects two or more local area networks at layer 2 of OSI model. 

  • A day falling between two public holidays and consequently designated as an additional holiday. 

span

verb
  • To extend through the distance between or across. 

  • To extend through (a time period). 

  • To measure by the span of the hand with the fingers extended, or with the fingers encompassing the object. 

  • To generate an entire space by means of linear combinations. 

  • To fetter, as a horse; to hobble. 

noun
  • The space of all linear combinations of something. 

  • A portion of something by length; a subsequence. 

  • A small space or a brief portion of time. 

  • The spread or extent of an arch or between its abutments, or of a beam, girder, truss, roof, bridge, or the like, between supports. 

  • The time required to execute a parallel algorithm on an infinite number of processors, i.e. the shortest distance across a directed acyclic graph representing the computation steps. 

  • wingspan of a plane or bird 

  • The length of a cable, wire, rope, chain between two consecutive supports. 

  • Any of various traditional units of length approximating this distance, especially the English handspan of 9 inches forming ⅛ fathom and equivalent to 22.86 cm. 

  • A pair of horses or other animals driven together; usually, such a pair of horses when similar in color, form, and action. 

  • A rope having its ends made fast so that a purchase can be hooked to the bight; also, a rope made fast in the center so that both ends can be used. 

  • The full width of an open hand from the end of the thumb to the end of the little finger used as an informal unit of length. 

How often have the words bridge and span occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )