hack

Use hack in a sentence

A man hacks at a pile of wood.

verb

The definition of hack is to have a dry harsh cough.
An example of hack is the type of cough which is often experienced by a person who smokes.
To hack is defined as to chop, cut or damage in a rough or irregular way.
An example of to hack is using a splitting maul to chop wood.

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"hack." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 20 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack>.

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hack. (n.d.). Retrieved January 20th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack

hack

1. to chop or cut crudely, roughly, or irregularly, as with a hatchet
2. to shape, trim, damage, etc. with or as with rough, sweeping strokes
to break up (land) as with a hoe or mattock
Slang to deal with or carry out successfully
Slang to annoy or irritate: usually with off
Slang, Sports to foul (an opponent) roughly

Origin of hack

Middle English hacken from Old English haccian, akin to German hacken from Indo-European base an unverified form keg-, peg, hook from source hook, hatchel

to make rough or irregular cuts
to give harsh, dry coughs

a tool for cutting or hacking, as an ax, hoe, mattock, etc.
a slash, gash, or notch made by a sharp implement
a hacking blow
a harsh, dry cough

hack Idioms

hack around

Informal to engage in aimless activity; spend time idly

hack it

Slang to carry out or manage something successfully

1. a horse for hire
2. a horse for all sorts of work
3. a saddle horse
4. an old, worn-out horse
a person hired to do routine, often dull, writing
a worker for a political party, usually holding office through patronage and serving devotedly and unquestioningly
a carriage or coach for hire
Informal
1. a taxicab
2. a hackman or cabdriver

Origin of hack

contr. from hackney

to employ as a hack
to hire out (a horse, etc.)
to wear out or make stale by constant use
Comput. to gain unauthorized access to (a file, network, etc.): to hack a company's personnel records

Brit. to jog along on a horse
Informal to drive a taxicab
Comput. to be a hacker; specif., to gain unauthorized access (into a particular file, network, etc.): to hack into a company's personnel files

employed as a hack: a hack writer
done by a hack: a hack job
stale; trite; hackneyed: hack writing

a grating or rack for drying cheese or fish, holding food for cattle, etc.

Origin of hack

origin, originally , board on which a falcon's meat was put, variant, variety of hatch

to place on a hack for drying

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"hack." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 20 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack>.

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hack. (n.d.). Retrieved January 20th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack

hack

verb

hacked, hack·ing, hacks

verb

transitive

To cut or chop with repeated and irregular blows: hacked down the saplings.
To make or shape by hitting or chopping with a sharp implement: hacked a trail through the forest.
To break up the surface of (soil).
a. To alter (a computer program): hacked her text editor to read HTML.
b. To gain access to (a computer file or network) illegally or without authorization: hacked the firm's personnel database.
Slang To cut or mutilate as if by hacking: hacked millions off the budget.
Slang To cope with successfully; manage: couldn't hack a second job.

verb

intransitive

To chop or cut something by hacking.
a. To write or refine computer programs skillfully.
b. To use one's skill in computer programming to gain illegal or unauthorized access to a file or network: hacked into the company's intranet.
To cough roughly or harshly.

noun

A rough, irregular cut made by hacking.
A tool, such as a hoe, used for hacking.
A blow made by hacking.
An attempt to hit a baseball; a swing of the bat.
a. An instance of gaining unauthorized access to a computer file or network.
b. A program that makes use of existing often proprietary software, adding new features to it.
c. A clever modification or improvement.
A rough, dry cough.

Origin of hack

Middle English hakken from Old English -haccian ; see keg- in Indo-European roots.V., intr., sense 2, back-formation from hacker ¹

Related Forms:

hack′a·ble
adjective

noun

A horse used for riding or driving; a hackney.
A worn-out horse for hire; a jade.
a. One who undertakes unpleasant or distasteful tasks for money or reward; a hireling.
b. A writer hired to produce routine or commercial writing.
A carriage or hackney for hire.
Informal
a. A taxicab.
b. See hackie.

verb

hacked, hack·ing, hacks

verb

transitive

To let out (a horse) for hire.
To make banal or hackneyed with indiscriminate use.

verb

intransitive

To drive a taxicab for a living.
To work for hire as a writer.
To ride on horseback at an ordinary pace.

adjective

By, characteristic of, or designating routine or commercial writing: hack prose.
Hackneyed; banal.

Phrasal Verbs: hack out Informal To produce (written material, for example), especially hastily or routinely: hacked out a weekly column.

Origin of hack

Short for hackney

THE AMERICAN HERITAGE® DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, FIFTH EDITION by the Editors of the American Heritage Dictionaries. Copyright © 2016, 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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"hack." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 20 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack>.

APA Style

hack. (n.d.). Retrieved January 20th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack

Verb

(third-person singular simple present hacks, present participle hacking, simple past and past participle hacked)

To chop or cut down in a rough manner. [circa 12th c.]
They hacked the brush down and made their way through the jungle.
(intransitive) To cough noisily. [19th c.]
This cold is awful. I can't stop hacking.
To withstand or put up with a difficult situation. [ 20th c.]
Can you hack it out here with no electricity or running water?
(slang, computing) To hack into; to gain unauthorized access to (a computer system, e.g., a website, or network) by manipulating code; to crack.
(slang, computing) By extension, to gain unauthorised access to a computer or online account belonging to (a person or organisation).
When I logged into the social network, I discovered I'd been hacked.
(computing) To accomplish a difficult programming task.
He can hack like no one else and make the program work as expected.
(computing) To make a quick code change to patch a computer program, often one that is inelegant or that makes the program harder to maintain.
I hacked in a fix for this bug, but we'll still have to do a real fix later.
To work on an intimately technical level.
I'm currently hacking distributed garbage collection.
(ice hockey) To strike an opponent's leg with one's hockey stick.
He's going to the penalty box after hacking the defender in front of the goal.
(ice hockey) To make a flailing attempt to hit the puck with a hockey stick.
There's a scramble in front of the net as the forwards are hacking at the bouncing puck.
(baseball) To swing at a pitched ball.
He went to the batter's box hacking.
To strike in a frantic movement.

Noun

(plural hacks)

A tool for chopping. [14th c.]
A hacking blow. [19th c.]
A gouge or notch made by such a blow.
A dry cough.
(figuratively) A try, an attempt. [19th c.]
(curling) The foothold traditionally cut into the ice from which the person who throws the rock pushes off for delivery.
(computing, slang) An illegal attempt to gain access to a computer network.
(computing) An interesting technical achievement, particularly in computer programming.
(computing) A small code change meant to patch a problem as quickly as possible.
(computing) An expedient, temporary solution, meant to be replaced with a more elegant solution at a later date.
(slang, military) Time check.
(baseball) A swing of the bat at a pitched ball by the batter.
He took a few hacks, but the pitcher finally struck him out.
A hacking; a catch in speaking; a short, broken cough.
A kick on the shins in football.

Related terms

marginal hacks

Origin

From Old English tohaccian (“hack to pieces”)

Noun

(plural hacks)

(falconry) A board which the falcon's food is placed on; used by extension for the state of partial freedom in which they are kept before being trained.
A food-rack for cattle.
A rack used to dry something, such as bricks, fish, or cheese.
A grating in a mill race.

Verb

(third-person singular simple present hacks, present participle hacking, simple past and past participle hacked)

To lay (bricks) on a rack to dry.
(falconry) To keep (young hawks) in a state of partial freedom, before they are trained.

Origin

Variations of hatch, heck.

Noun

(plural hacks)

A person, often a journalist, hired to do routine work. (newspaper hack) [from the 17th c.]
- I got by on hack work for years before I finally published my novel.
(pejorative) Someone who is available for hire; hireling, mercenary.
(slang) A taxicab (hackney cab) driver.
A coach or carriage let for hire; particularly, a coach with two seats inside facing each other; a hackney coach.
(pejorative) An untalented writer.
- Dason is nothing but a two-bit hack.
- He's nothing but the typical hack writer.
(pejorative) One who is professionally successful despite producing mediocre work. (Usually applied to persons in a creative field.)
(pejorative) A talented writer-for-hire, paid to put others' thoughts into felicitous language.
(politics) A political agitator. (slightly derogatory)

Verb

(third-person singular simple present hacks, present participle hacking, simple past and past participle hacked)

(dated) To make common or cliched; to vulgarise.
To ride a horse at a regular pace; to ride on a road (as opposed to riding cross-country etc.).
To use as a hack; to let out for hire.
To use frequently and indiscriminately, so as to render trite and commonplace.

Origin

Abbreviation of hackney (“an ordinary horse”), probably from place name Hackney

Noun

(plural hacks)

A small ball usually made of woven cotton or suede and filled with rice, sand or some other filler, for the use in hackeysack.

Verb

(third-person singular simple present hacks, present participle hacking, simple past and past participle hacked)

To play hackeysack.

Origin

From hackysack

English Wiktionary. Available under CC-BY-SA license.

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MLA Style

"hack." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 20 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack>.

APA Style

hack. (n.d.). Retrieved January 20th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack

hack - Computer Definition

As a noun, a hack is the source code of a program. For example, the phrase "it must be done through a hack" means someone has to write programming code to solve the problem because there is no pre-written software that does the job. As a verb, hack refers to writing a small program or adding code to an existing program to solve a problem in a hurry. A hack used to imply a low-level programming language, even deploying a fix in machine language (see patch). However, the term evolved, and today it can refer to code in any computer language. See machine language. You're Not Supposed To! A hack may refer to an enhancement made to an electronic device that was not designed to be user programmable, such as a video game, music player, TV set-top box or cellphone. For example, a digital media hub (media extender) could be modified to play additional formats. This level of modification is done by the serious hacker, who first has to find a way to expose the software. It may require opening the case and using tools such as a screwdriver, wire strippers and soldering iron. For example, to make the first AT&T iPhones work in another network, an early hack required applying voltage to a line on its circuit board. It meant scraping the surface of a single wire trace without breaking the line and soldering a wire to it; a very delicate operation. Subsequent methods used to unlock iPhones were less extreme. "Hacked" Means a Harmful Hack "Getting hacked" has another connotation. Although the original meaning of hack is program code that was modified, the popular definition is an illegal modification that causes a computer or online account to be compromised. See attack, hacker and hackathon.

Geek Humor

From "The Best of The Joy of Tech" cartoon book by Nitrozac and Snaggy (O'Reilly Media, Inc., 2003, ISBN 0-596-00578-4). (Image courtesy of GeekCulture, www.geekculture.com)

Hacks Galore

The term is often used to refer to any tip or technique for improving performance or configuring hardware or software; witness these titles from O'Reilly Media, Inc.

Hack Everything!

"The Big Book of Hacks" offers imaginative hacks from turning an old netbook into a tablet to boosting Wi-Fi with a vegetable steamer. Also included are how to make fridge magnets from a hard drive and a dipole antenna from a closet hanger. See life hack.

Computer Desktop Encyclopedia THIS DEFINITION IS FOR PERSONAL USE ONLY All other reproduction is strictly prohibited without permission from the publisher. © 1981-2017 The Computer Language Company Inc. All rights reserved.

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MLA Style

"hack." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 20 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack>.

APA Style

hack. (n.d.). Retrieved January 20th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/Hack

hack

hack

hack

hack - Computer Definition

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hack

hack

hack

hack - Computer Definition

Sentence Examples

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