vadding

	This is the JargonFile ^(V4.00) entry for vadding - Next: vanilla, Prev: V7
:vadding: /vading/ /n./ [from VAD, a permutation of ADV (i.e., ADVENT), used to avoid a particular admins continual search-and-destroy sweeps for the game] A leisure-time activity of certain hackers involving the covert exploration of the secret parts of large buildings -- basements, roofs, freight elevators, maintenance crawlways, steam tunnels, and the like. A few go so far as to learn locksmithing in order to synthesize vadding keys. The verb is to vad (compare phreaking; see also hack, sense 9). This term dates from the late 1970s, before which such activity was simply called hacking; the older usage is still prevalent at MIT. The most extreme and dangerous form of vadding is elevator rodeo, a.k.a. elevator surfing, a sport played by wrasslin down a thousand-pound elevator car with a 3-foot piece of string, and then exploiting this mastery in various stimulating ways (such as elevator hopping, shaft exploration, rat-racing, and the ever-popular drop experiments). Kids, dont try this at home! See also hobbit (sense 2).
* (text is auto-included via JargonExtension by mutante using jargon with VERSION 4.0.0, 24 JUL 1996* - JargonFile by Eric S. Raymond is in the public domain)*