咱们国家古代的传说里常有乡绅们带着民众一起祈雨的场面，祈雨的主角通常是口中念念有词、貌似法力无边的道士或巫师，他们烧香念咒、手舞足蹈，好像这样就可以把信息传递给上苍了。其实，在古希腊、古印度也都有类似的做法，人们把这样的仪式行为统称为rain dance（祈雨舞）。不过，到了信息时代，rain dance似乎已经和祈雨没什么关系了。

A rain dance is a ceremonial dance that is performed in order to invoke¹ rain and to ensure the protection of the harvest.

祈雨舞（rain dance）是为了保证农作物丰收而祈雨时跳的仪式型舞蹈。

In hacker’s jargon², rain dance refers to any ceremonial action taken to correct a hardware problem, with the expectation that nothing will be accomplished³. This especially applies to reseating printed circuit boards, reconnecting cables, etc.

在电脑黑客词典里，祈雨舞则指针对硬件问题所做的任何程序性、且不太有可能奏效的操作，尤指重置印刷电路板或重接线路等操作。

For example:

I can't boot up the machine. We'll have to wait for Greg to do his rain dance.

我的机器不能启动了。我们得等格雷格来做程序重置。