spanner

noun

1. (Commonwealth, Ireland, UK)A hand tool for adjusting nuts and bolts.

   “Pass me that spanner, Jake; there's just one more bolt to screw in.”

   “Tools don’t have judgment or ethics, and they might fail to push back on bad ideas or dangerous requests. “Your spanner’s never like, ‘This shouldn’t be built,’” she said, using a British term for wrench.”

2. (Canada, Commonwealth, Ireland, UK, US)A hand tool for adjusting nuts and bolts.

   “The groove in this toolholder is what the spanner grabs onto when you are changing the tool.”

3. (rare)One who, or that which, spans.

   “The scheme of the spanner of continents and the desire of the little husbandman hoarding for his loved ones...”

4. A (usually sparse) graph whose shortest path distances approximate those in a dense graph or other metric space.
5. A hand tool shaped like a small crank handle, for winding the spring of a wheel lock on a musket.

   “The spanner for spanning or winding up the spring of the wheel lock.”

6. (obsolete)A device in early steam engines for moving the valves for the alternate admission and shutting off of the steam.
7. (Ireland, UK)A problem, dilemma or obstacle; something unexpected or troublesome (in the phrase spanner in the works)

   “Halfway through the production of Macbeth, the director found that the stage was smaller than he expected. This really threw a spanner in the works.”

8. (Ireland, UK, derogatory, mildly)A stupid or unintelligent person; one prone to making mistakes, especially in language.

   “You spanner, Rodney! I wanted some time, not a bunch of thyme!”

verb

1. To use a spanner; to fix with a spanner