bootstrap
pronunciation
How to pronounce bootstrap in British English:
UK [ˈbu:tstræp]
How to pronounce bootstrap in American English:
US ['butstræp]
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- Noun:
- a strap that is looped and sewn to the top of a boot for pulling it on
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- Verb:
- help oneself, often through improvised means
Word Origin
- bootstrap (n.)
- also boot-strap, tab or loop at the back of the top of a men's boot, which the wearer hooked a finger through to pull the boots on, 1870, from boot (n.) + strap (n.). Circa 1900, to pull (oneself) up by (one's) bootstraps was used figuratively of an impossible task (Among the "practical questions" at the end of chapter one of Steele's "Popular Physics" schoolbook (1888) is, "30. Why can not a man lift himself by pulling up on his boot-straps?"). By 1916 its meaning expanded to include "better oneself by rigorous, unaided effort." The meaning "fixed sequence of instructions to load the operating system of a computer" (1953) is from the notion of the first-loaded program pulling itself, and the rest, up by the bootstrap.