wedged

adj. 1. To be stuck, incapable of proceeding without help. This is different
from having crashed. If the system has crashed, it has become totally
non-functioning. If the system is wedged, it is trying to do something but
cannot make progress; it may be capable of doing a few things, but not be
fully operational. For example, a process may become wedged if it deadlock s
with another (but not all instances of wedging are deadlocks). See also
gronk , locked up , hosed , hung (wedged is more severe than hung ). 2.
Often refers to humans suffering misconceptions. He's totally wedged he's
convinced that he can levitate through meditation. 3. [Unix] Specifically
used to describe the state of a TTY left in a losing state by abort of a
screen-oriented program or one that has messed with the line discipline in
some obscure way. There is some dispute over the origin of this term. It is
usually thought to derive from a common description of recto-cranial
inversion; however, it may actually have originated with older hot-press
printing technology in which physical type elements were locked into type
frames with wedges driven in by mallets. Once this had been done, no changes
in the typesetting for that page could be made.

