Still talking to myself, but this is quite interesting and complex.

Here on one site I learn that regular old run-of-the-mill compound words are called:

Root or Primary compounds

The site I visited used houseboat as an example. What you see is what you get, and you don't have to figure out anything much as you would with riding boot[, for example or redskin.

And then there are, too, synthetic compounds that had to do with position of verbals in what was called the 'head' of the compound (e.g., driver in 'truck driver,' the head usually being the last word in the compound, according to the site information).

Anyway, here's the URL. There's a lot to read there that is fun decoding:

http://santana.uni-muenster.de/Seminars/MorphologyHS_WS02/transparencies/morphologie11b.pdf