bit twiddling

bit twiddling
 n.

   [very common]

   1. (pejorative) An exercise in tuning (see {tune}) in which incredible
   amounts of time and effort go to produce little noticeable
   improvement, often with the result that the code becomes
   incomprehensible.

   2. Aimless small modification to a program, esp. for some pointless
   goal.

   3. Approx. syn. for {bit bashing}; esp. used for the act of frobbing
   the device control register of a peripheral in an attempt to get it
   back to a known state.
    

bit twiddling

   1. (pejorative) An exercise in tuning (see {tune}) in which
   incredible amounts of time and effort go to produce little
   noticeable improvement, often with the result that the code
   becomes incomprehensible.

   2. Aimless small modification to a program, especially for
   some pointless goal.

   3. {bit bashing}, especially used for the act of frobbing the
   device control register of a peripheral in an attempt to get
   it back to a known state.

   [{Jargon File}]