Hacking is widely considered to historically mean "using a system in a creative and unusual way to get it to behave in ways that were not anticipated or intended by the creator". A hacker is a tinkerer. Some tinkerers do crime. Most don't.
Asking this on a site called Hacker News is gold.
Heh, true, but when I think about open source, I think of "developing". Hacking indicates a restricted device being unlocked or doing things that it was not meant to do. If this is the definition of hacking, installing Ubuntu on a brand-new machine is hacking.
it's the difference between "hacking" and "hacking on"
No it doesn't. Hacking meant something akin to "tinkering" long before it meant unauthorised compromise of a system.
You are saying exactly what I said in my first response.
Hacking means much more than just breaking into systems ...
I'm old enough to have lived through at least seven definitions of "hacker."
Including the one in the late 1970's when a hacker was someone who took public domain software and then sold it commercially with their own name on it.