Moving or working with slow and patient diligence; patiently laborious: as, a man of plodding habits.

adjective. Progressing in a slow, toilsome manner; characterized by laborious diligence

verb. Present participle of plod.

adjective. Progressing slowly and laboriously.

adjective. (of movement) slow and laborious

noun. hard monotonous routine work

noun. the act of walking with a slow heavy gait

"And once you have those items, deriving the required engineering data to build a useful bomb is an exercise in plodding along (or, with more money, certain parties just might be willing to sell you that supposedly ultra-secret data)."

effortful  

ploddingness  

labor  labour  toil  walk  walking  

codding  godding  nodding  prodding  rodding  

application  arid  assiduity  assiduous  assiduousness  

plod