Mapper

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˈmæpɚ/

Definitions

1. An individual or tool responsible for producing visual depictions of environments or datasets
2. A person or device that formulates graphical illustrations of spatial data or geographical regions
3. A professional or instrument that creates detailed representations of locations or data sets in a visual format

Etymology: The most useful thing to know about "mapper" is that it is a plain, transparent build: the noun "map" with the agent suffix "-er" attached, meaning one who maps or the thing that does the mapping. English has used "-er" this way since Old English, when the ending came from Proto-Germanic and was spelled "-ere," and in the Middle English period it passed through Old French "-ier," which itself descended from the Latin "-ārius." That long suffix history explains why the same ending turns up in words as different as "baker" and "teacher." The base word "map" has a more tangled past. Its ancestor is Latin "mappa," a cloth or napkin, and the sense of a drawn representation of land came later, so a mapper is, historically, a person who works with something first meant as a sheet of cloth. The word itself is a modern coinage in the sense the definition gives, built from a familiar root rather than borrowed, so its meaning has changed little from the simple idea of one who maps.

Synonyms: cartographer, planner, designer, layout artist, illustrator