Dictionary

wheel war en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (US) audio

Etymology

From wheel (“superuser on certain systems”) + war.

Meanings

1. (slang) A conflict in which users of a given computer system or (later) wiki who have administrative privileges try to lock each other out of the system or repeatedly attempt to reverse each other’s administrative actions.
   • WHEEL WARS. A period during which student wheels hack each other by attempting to log each other out of the system, delete each other’s files, or otherwise wreak havoc—usually at the expense of the lesser users. A battle of Titans (heh heh). [1983, Guy L. Steele Jr., Donald R. Woods, Raphael A. Finkel, Mark R. Crispin, Richard M. Stallman, Geoffrey S. Goodfellow, The Hacker’s Dictionary: A Guide to the Computer Underground, New York: Harper & Row, →ISBN, page 123:
   • Many of us prefer to ask a colleague to intervene in a situation in which we risk entering a “wheel war” (when two or more editors revert each others’ edits over and over) or when we believe we need a consultation with a fresh eye. 2014, Dariusz Jemielniak, Common Knowledge? An Ethnography of Wikipedia, Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, →ISBN, page 52:
   • Wikipedia policy prohibits “wheel wars”—cases in which a Wikipedia administrator repeatedly undoes the action of another—just as it prohibits edit wars. 2008, Jonathan Zittrain, The Future of the Internet and How to Stop It, New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, →ISBN, page 290:

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