Hard-wiring involves soldering wires directly between terminals or components to create a fixed electrical path. This prevents the connection from vibrating loose in high-stress environments and eliminates the contact resistance of headers or plugs. In digital design, it also means tying a logic pin directly to ground or VCC to permanently set its state, bypassing any programmable logic.
Heard on the job
We need to hard-wire the enable pin to the 5V rail so the regulator stays on permanently during the test sequence.