WHY IS YOUR PC BOOTED?

 

Beginners of English understand what it means if you say your PC has been started. But they would have a hard time when they heard someone say that their PC was being booted.

 

If a PC is booted, it is started. It sounds weird, but let’s examine its etymology.

 

The word boot here is abbreviated from bootstrap. A boot is footwear; a bootstrap is a strap attached to the back or side of a boot, whose purpose it is to help the wearer to pull on the footwear. Hence, when a computer is bootstrapped, the operating system on which the PC runs gets itself ready by starting all the necessary files and services. If you bootstrap, you pull your boots on by the strap. If a PC is booted, it gets the OS ready as if by a bootstrap. Hence the expression, to boot your PC.