The word “compass” means “to go around in a circular course,” since you can create a circle using a compass by going around in a circular motion on a sheet of paper this word fits the motion. ... The drawing compass has a needle on one end and a writing utensil of some sort, usually a pencil or lead, on the other end.
Because a compass is relatively simple instrument, it is possible to make one at home. Take one sewing needle and rub it with a magnet in one direction until it becomes magnetized. Take a cork and cut 5mm of it with a sharp knife. ... When you put cork with a needle in a glass of water, needle will point North.
Some famous fictional compasses are the star chart embedded in Cale Tucker's hand in TITAN A.E. It reorients its pointer while Cale stands on the precise spot where his father once stood on the planet Sessharrim.
Jack's compass in Pirates of the Caribbean which points to whatever the one holding it wants. Jack being The Alcoholic, it spends a lot of time pointing to a bottle of rum.
Inigo Montoya briefly turns his sword into one in The Princess Bride. He knows the secret entrance to the Pit of Despair is in the grove where he's standing, so he pleads with his dead father to "guide my sword" so he can find it. The sword sticks itself into a tree, and Inigo leans on the tree in despair - and, in so doing, triggers the mechanism to open the door.
Terry Pratchett’s Discworld, being "as coreless as a pancake", lacks a magnetic field. A needle of the intensely magical metal octiron will align itself to the Background Magic Field and therefore always point towards the Hub.
In One Piece, rather than point north the Log Pose, a special compass used to navigate the Grand Line, instead points to nearby islands. This is because islands on the Grand Line have magnetic fields of their own so powerful they make any normal compass useless. Once you arrive at an island, the Log Pose "logs" the island after enough time passes and begins pointing to the next island.