The story
From the fact that in cattle it is usually caused by hardware such as a piece of wire or a fastener (e.g., fence wire, nail, screw).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.
hardware disease
Today it means: Traumatic gastrointestinal puncture and infection in ruminants (especially cattle) and birds that ingest a sharp object (in livestock usually a metal object such as wire or a fastener); in cattle it usually includes reticuloperitonitis and thus in practice is usually metonymically synonymous with traumatic reticuloperitonitis. Full definition →