What is "bootstrapping"

vb. (present participle of bootstrap English)

In general parlance, bootstrapping usually refers to a self-starting process that is supposed to proceed without external input. In computer technology the term (usually shortened to booting) usually refers to the process of loading the basic software into the memory of a computer after power-on or general reset, especially the operating system which will then take care of loading other software as needed.

The term appears to have originated in the early 19th century United States (particularly in the phrase "pull oneself over a fence by one's bootstraps"), to mean an absurdly impossible action, an adynaton.

In computer science, bootstrapping is the process of writing a compiler (or assembler) in the source programming language that it intends to compile. Applying this technique leads to a self-hosting compiler. An initial minimal core version of the compiler is generated in a different language; from that point, successive expanded versions of the compiler are run using the minimal core of the language.

Many compilers for many programming languages are bootstrapped, including compilers for BASIC, ALGOL, C, D, Pascal, PL/I, Factor, Haskell, Modula-2, Oberon, OCaml, Common Lisp, Scheme, Go, Java, Rust, Python, Scala, Nim, Eiffel, and more.

1. redirect Bootstrapping#Computing

Bootstrapping is a term used in language acquisition in the field of linguistics. It refers to the idea that human beings are born innately equipped with a mental faculty that forms the basis of language, and that allows children to effortlessly acquire language. As a process, bootstrapping can be divided into different domains, according to whether it involves semantic bootstrapping, syntactic bootstrapping, prosodic bootstrapping, or pragmatic bootstrapping.

The idea of bootstrapping is significant in a number of fields in the biological sciences. The process by which a fertilised ovum develops into an embryo, particularly the way in which the nuclear genome is expressed differently in its various cells as these differentiate, is one example of bootstrapping. The evolution of progressively better adapted organs through natural selection in a lineage of organisms is another.

Some biologists, including Graham Cairns-Smith, believe that the origin of life itself may have been a bootstrap process as one or more systems of biological information storage formed the foundation for successor systems that ultimately supplanted them culminating in the emergence of our current DNA-based system.

In the field of electronics, a bootstrap circuit is one where part of the output of an amplifier stage is applied to the input, so as to alter the input impedance of the amplifier. When applied deliberately, the intention is usually to increase rather than decrease the impedance. Generally, any technique where part of the output of a system is used at startup is described as bootstrapping.

In the domain of MOSFET circuits, "bootstrapping" is commonly used to mean pulling up the operating point of a transistor above the power supply rail. The same term has been used somewhat more generally for dynamically altering the operating point of an operational amplifier (by shifting both its positive and negative supply rail) in order to increase its output voltage swing (relative to the ground). In the sense used in this paragraph, bootstrapping an operational amplifier means "using a signal to drive the reference point of the op-amp's power supplies". A more sophisticated use of this rail bootstrapping technique is to alter the non-linear C/V characteristic of the inputs of a JFET op-amp in order to decrease its distortion.

In statistics, bootstrapping can refer to any test or metric that relies on random sampling with replacement. Bootstrapping allows assigning measures of accuracy (defined in terms of bias, variance, confidence intervals, prediction error or some other such measure) to sample estimates. This technique allows estimation of the sampling distribution of almost any statistic using random sampling methods. Generally, it falls in the broader class of resampling methods.

Bootstrapping is the practice of estimating properties of an estimator (such as its variance) by measuring those properties when sampling from an approximating distribution. One standard choice for an approximating distribution is the empirical distribution function of the observed data. In the case where a set of observations can be assumed to be from an independent and identically distributed population, this can be implemented by constructing a number of resamples with replacement, of the observed dataset (and of equal size to the observed dataset).

It may also be used for constructing hypothesis tests. It is often used as an alternative to statistical inference based on the assumption of a parametric model when that assumption is in doubt, or where parametric inference is impossible or requires complicated formulas for the calculation of standard errors.

The bootstrapping rule in the rules of evidence dealt with admissibility as non- hearsay of statements of conspiracy in United States federal courts. The rule, in a criminal prosecution for conspiracy, was that the court, in deciding whether to allow the jury to consider a statement of conspiracy, cannot hear the statement itself: the allegation had to be supported by independent evidence.

If the independent evidence convinced the court that a conspiracy probably existed, only then such a statement could be introduced into trial and heard by the jury. Allowing such statements of conspiracy to prove the existence of conspiracy was considered similar to bootstrapping. In the United States, the bootstrapping rule has been eliminated from the Federal Rules of Evidence, as decided by the Supreme Court in the Bourjaily case.

For example, if a man commits four crimes, unless the evidence is connectable to each crime, each piece of evidence can be used only in each separate crime and not to link any crime to another.

In law, bootstrapping can also refer to an attempt to gain jurisdiction over a non-jurisdictional matter by its circuitous relationship to a jurisdictional matter.

In finance, bootstrapping is a method for constructing a ( zero-coupon) fixed-income yield curve from the prices of a set of coupon-bearing products, e.g. bonds and swaps.1 A bootstrapped curve, correspondingly, is one where the prices of the instruments used as an input to the curve, will be an exact output, when these same instruments are valued using this curve. Here, the term structure of spot returns is recovered from the bond yields by solving for them recursively, by forward substitution: this iterative process is called the bootstrap method. The usefulness of bootstrapping is that using only a few carefully selected zero-coupon products, it becomes possible to derive par swap rates (forward and spot) for all maturities given the solved curve.

Bootstrap or bootstrapping may refer to:

• Straps attached to a boot for greater ease of putting it on

Other meanings are:

• Bootstrap (front-end framework), a free collection of tools for creating websites and web applications
• Bootstrap curriculum, a curriculum which uses computer programming to teach algebra to students age 12-16
• Bootstrapping, any process where a simple system activates a more complicated system, used in computing, linguistics, physics, biology, electronics, statistics, finance, etc.
• Bootstrapping (electronics), a type of circuit that employs positive feedback.
• Bootstrapping (compilers), the process of writing a compiler in the programming language it is intended to compile
• Bootstrapping (finance), a method for constructing a yield curve from the prices of coupon-bearing products
• Bootstrapping (law), a former rule of evidence in federal conspiracy trials
• Bootstrapping (statistics), a method for assigning measures of accuracy to sample estimates
• Bootstrap funding in entrepreneurship and startups