Short answers, pulled from the story.
Carpentry is a skilled trade and craft centered on the cutting, shaping, and installation of building materials during the construction of buildings, ships, timber bridges, and concrete formwork. Carpenters traditionally worked with natural wood doing rougher work such as framing, though today they handle services from door and window installation to flooring, trim, custom woodworking, stair construction, and structural framing.
The word "carpenter" is the English rendering of the Old French carpentier, later charpentier, derived from the Latin carpentarius, meaning the maker of a carriage. The older Middle English and Scots word for a builder was wright, from the Old English wryhta, which survives in compounds like wheelwright and boatwright.
Carpenters normally train through an apprenticeship of about four years, then qualify by passing a country's competence test in places such as the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Switzerland, Australia, and South Africa. In the United States, journeyperson status follows twelve weeks of pre-apprenticeship training and four years of on-the-job field training.
Carpentry historically refers to the heavier and stronger structural work, while joinery refers to lighter and more ornamental work. In the United Kingdom, the off-site manufacture and pre-finishing of items like skirting boards and doors is regarded as joinery, while their on-site installation is regarded as carpentry.
Some of the oldest archaeological evidence of carpentry are water well casings, including an oak and hazel structure dating from 5256 BC found in Ostrov, Czech Republic. Among the oldest surviving wooden buildings are China's Nanchan Temple, built in 782, England's Greensted Church with parts from the 11th century, and Norway's stave churches from the 12th and 13th centuries.
Carpentry hazards include machine hazards, flying materials, fire and explosion, electrocution, noise, vibration, dust, and chemicals. In U.S. construction, the leading causes of fatalities are the "fatal four": falls, struck by object, electrocution, and caught-in or between.
Types of carpenters include framers who build a building's skeletal structure, finish carpenters who install molding and trim, formwork carpenters who build concrete shuttering, and shipwrights who do carpentry on vessels. Specialist branches include cabinetmakers, furniture makers, luthiers who make stringed instruments, green carpenters using sustainable materials, and Japanese roles such as the Miya-daiku temple carpenter.