A rats nest refers to a severe tangle of wiring on a test bench, inside a chassis, or connecting various pieces of equipment. In printed circuit board design software, the rats nest is the visual display of straight, unrouted logical connections between component pins before the physical copper traces are drawn. Technicians despise physical rats nests because they make troubleshooting difficult, induce crosstalk, and obscure faulty connections.
Heard on the job
Before we power up the prototype, we need to clean up this rats nest of jumper wires so nothing shorts out.
Insider tip
In PCB layout software, clearing the rats nest means you have successfully routed every required connection on the board.
Also heard as
- rat's nest