Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also hack off, hell-hack) to irritate, to annoy.

1892		J.C. Harris Uncle Remus and Friends 349: When you once git ’em hacked dey er hacked fer good; dey des give right up en roll der eyes [DA].
1909		Sat. Eve. Post 3 July 6: Gosh, it hacks me! [HDAS].
1917		H. Kephart ‘A Word-List From The Mountains Of Western North Carolina’ in DN IV vi 413: hack, v. To annoy; nettle. ‘That joke hacks Steve to this day.’.
1922		A.C. Inman 22 Apr. diary in Aaron (1985) 201: This being looked upon by people as an invalid [...] has hacked me.
1934		Z.N. Hurston Jonah’s Gourd Vine (1995) 43: You ain’t nothin’ and ain’t got nothin’ but whut God give uh billy-goat, and then round tryin’ tuh hell-hack folks! Tryin’ tuh kill somebody wid talk. [Ibid.] 66: Mama, yuh been hell-hackin’ me eve’y since us tole yuh us wuz gointer git married.
1953		Randolph & Wilson Down in the Holler 156: Hack and wad are transitive verbs that mean pretty much the same as bore.
1961		J. Blake letter 15 May in Joint (1972) 173: What really hacked me was his bland assumption that I would be stupid enough to allow him to move all the Heat he had collected into my vicinity.
1971		Current Sl. V:4 12: Hack . . . off, v. To irritate or anger.
1986		C. Hiaasen Tourist Season (1987) 289: It’s his attitude that hacks me off.
2005		J. Waller Twisted Mile 47: I’m more than certain that he’s hacked off at us.

2. (US campus) to tease gently.

1905		J.W. Carr ‘Words from Northwest Arkansas’ in DN III:i 82: hack, v. To embarrass. ‘He was hacked’.
1997–2000		Da Bomb 🌐 14: Hack: To playfully tease.

3. (orig. computing) to tinker with a computer system for pleasure and as a proof of one’s expertise.

[1955		minute of Tech Model Railroad Club of M.I.T 5 Apr. cited on ADS-L 16 June 2005 🌐 Mr. Eccles requests that anyone working or hacking on the electrical system turn the power off to avoid fuse blowing].
1975		Partisan Rev. 42 241: The compulsive programmer spends all the time he can working on one of his big projects. ‘Working’ is not the word he uses; he calls what he does ‘hacking’ .
1983		A. Naiman Computer Dict. 68: This week I’m hacking the terminal driver [HDAS].

4. (orig. computing) to gain unauthorized access to a tehcnological system, e.g. a computer, a telephone, (and poss. use that access for illegal activities).

1983		N.Y. Times 28 Aug. IV 20: Hackers...wouldn’t...think of calling up on the telephone and saying, ‘Hi, I’m a bright young guy and I’d like to hack your computer’ .
1993		L.A. Times Mag. 12 Sept. 24: He hacked Pacific Bell computers to obtain ‘unpublished telephone numbers for the Soviet Consulate’ .
2020		D. Winslow ‘Crime 101’ in Broken 75: [T]he robber hacked Sam’s emails.
2023		M. Herron Secret Hours 90: And what about his mobile – had it been hacked, was he transmitting his location to the intelligence services?

5. in basketball to foul an opponent by striiking them with the arm or hand.

1990		W.D. Myers Mouse Rap 33: I mean the dude goes off. The sweat’s popping off my man and he’s grunting and carrying on and hacking dudes to death.
2003		W.D. Myers Dream Bearer 24: We didn’t play one-on-one because I didn’t feel like getting hacked to death.

6. se sense 3 or 4 but with systems other than computers.

2010		J, Lanier You Are Not a Gadget 140: I suppose [...] an aggregation of amateurs and robots might someday hack genes [...] and tweet DNA sequences around the globe.
2016		Observer (London) 15 May 42/1: ‘Cloud chasing’ [...] involved tricks such as blowing smoke rings [...] Skilled vapers can ‘hack’ their devices to change the size of the vapour clouds they emit.