Shelter-half also refers to the name of a Vietnam-era GI resistance coffeehouse. See The Shelter Half

The Shelter Half

The Shelter Half was a coffeehouse in Tacoma, Washington, from 1968 to 1974. Like its namesake, a Shelter-half is a simple tent to provide shelter, the Shelter Half's purpose was to provide a place for GIs at Fort Lewis military base in Washington State to resist the war in Vietnam...

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In UK and Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, a shelter-half, also known as a "dog-tent" or "pup-tent", is a simple kind of tent

Tent

A tent is a shelter consisting of sheets of fabric or other material draped over or attached to a frame of poles or attached to a supporting rope. While smaller tents may be free-standing or attached to the ground, large tents are usually anchored using guy ropes tied to stakes or tent pegs...

 designed to provide temporary shelter and/or concealment. Two sheets of canvas or a similar material (the halves) are fastened together with snaps, straps or buttons to form a larger surface. The shelter-half is then erected using poles, ropes, pegs, and whatever tools are on hand, forming an inverted V structure. Often, each soldier carries one shelter-half and half the poles, etc., and they pair off to erect a two-man tent.

Shelter-halfs are usually designed to serve double duty as ponchos against the rain, or for the concealment of snipers.