Prefixer

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Someone or something that adds a prefix, a unit placed before a root to alter its meaning, to a word
2. A person or device that attaches an affix placed at the start of a base word to form a new term
3. Anything that places a leading element before a stem so that the resulting word carries a modified sense

Etymology: "Prefixer" is a simple formation: the prefix "prefix," a word that itself came into English from Late Latin "praefixus," meaning "fixed in front," combined with the agent suffix "-er," which names a person or thing that performs an action. A prefixer, then, is one who or that which attaches something at the front of another thing. The noun is the kind of transparent coinage that English builds freely from grammatical terms, so its meaning follows directly from its parts. The "prefix" element itself, used for a word-part attached before a base, is the older and more basic term from which the agent noun is derived.