Other forms: routers
A router is the box that spreads the internet through your home. Reset the router, the router light, a wireless router.
Its job is to decide where each packet of data goes next, and a home router usually also acts as a modem, a switch and a wireless access point in one case. Turning it off and on again really does fix a surprising share of faults. Note that a router is also a woodworking tool for cutting grooves, pronounced differently in Britain — rooter for the network and rowter for the tool.
1nounrouterThe box that spreads the internet through a building.
“The router is in the hall, so the signal is weak in my bedroom upstairs.”
2nounwoodworkingA woodworking tool for cutting grooves.
“He used a router to cut a neat groove along the edge of the shelf.”
router is a device.
Route plus -er. Route came from Old French rute, from Latin rupta via, a broken way — a road cut through. The tool and the network device are the same formation.
Proto-Indo-European
*Hrewp-
Latin
rupta via
Old French
rote
Middle English
route
English
route
English, today
router
From route + -er. route comes from Middle English route, from Old French rote, from Latin rupta via literally “a path made by force”. Compare Modern French route. See routine. Further via ruptus related with bankrupt. Unrelated to road.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA