Constructor

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /kənˈstɹʌktɚ/

Definitions

1. A person or method responsible for the creation and assembly of structures or objects may also refer to a function that initializes newly created entities with specific attributes and conditions
2. The term encompasses individuals who build or create physical items and software methods that establish the initial characteristics of new objects
3. Someone who physically assembles buildings, machines, or other items ; a programming routine that sets initial values when an object is instantiated

Etymology: The Latin verb "struere" meant to pile up, heap, or arrange, and when it was combined with "com-" (together) it produced "construere," to build or put together. Medieval Latin speakers then formed "constructor," one who builds, by adding the agent suffix "-or" to that verb's stem. English borrowed the word from that Medieval Latin form, so a constructor is, at root, simply a builder in the most literal sense. The English word keeps that physical sense: a person who raises walls, bridges, or machines. Its broader use, for someone who establishes the basic features of something new, grew out of the same idea of putting parts together into a whole. The software sense, a special method that creates and initializes a new object, is a modern extension of that broader meaning, applied to programming.

Synonyms: builder, creator, developer

Antonyms: destroyer