1. (Perhaps by analogy to a bouncing check) An {electronic mail} message that is undeliverable and returns an error notification (a "bounce message") to the sender is said to "bounce".2. To play volleyball.The now-demolished D. C. Power Lab building used by the Stanford AI Lab in the 1970s had a volleyball court on the front lawn.From 5 PM to 7 PM was the scheduled maintenance time for the computer, so every afternoon at 5 would come over the intercom the cry: "Now hear this: bounce, bounce!", followed by Brian McCune loudly bouncing a volleyball on the floor outside the offices of known volleyballers.3. To engage in sexual intercourseprobably from the expression "bouncing the mattress", but influenced by Roo' s psychosexually loaded "Try bouncing me, Tigger!" from the "Winnie-the-Pooh" books.Compare boink.4. To casually reboot a system in order to clear up a transient problem.Reported primarily among VMS users.5. (VM/CMS programmers) Automatic warm-start of a computer after an error."I logged on this morning and found it had bounced 7 times during the night"6. (IBM) To power cycle a peripheral in order to reset it.[Jargon File](1994-11-29)