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Glite Dictionary
🧑‍🦰 A killer 🌳 A vine or tree 💻 A software method
strangler

strangler

8.3
A way to replace an old computer system gradually by adding new parts that do its work
  • noun
  • /ˈstræŋɡlər/
  • Specialized
translation icon : patrón Strangler
  • The developers turned to the strangler technique to modernize the application in stages, ensuring reliability at each phase.

Examples

  • By using the strangler approach, the company was able to replace its outdated software without service disruptions.

  • It had been the strangler of spontaneity and impulse.

    Fiction book (1994)

  • The software team implemented a strangler pattern to gradually transition to the new system.

Compounds

strangler fig
1 8.5

A tropical tree that begins life on another tree then grows around and often kills it

Florida strangler fig
  • Specialized
8.5

A large tree that starts on another tree and grows roots that wrap and cover the host

strangler tree
9.5

A tree or vine that grows on another tree and sends roots down to surround and kill it

Surface Forms

strangler singular
stranglers plural

Morphology

strangler = strangle (opaque) = strangle + er

Although it is historically built from 'strangle' + '-er', the software term is a domain-specific metaphor whose meaning is not readily predictable from the base word alone.

Etymology

Strangler in software takes its name from the strangler fig plant because, like the plant, new code grows around the old system and slowly replaces it, so the pattern means 'replace something gradually'.