Yeah door locks are maybe 6-9 inches higher than the level of a desk but you have to crouch down to be at eye level with them so you can pick them.

Or you could borrow the magic chair that apparently appears at a terminal when you hack it whether there was one there or not when you snuck up to it....

I get what you are saying but I can see why Bethesda might feel that hacking is less stealthy than picking locks.

I obviously enjoy stealthed bonus damage VATS headshots too much

It ruins the overall flow of the game, honestly. Hitting 'e', pressing three answers at random, backing out, hitting 'e' again, wash, rinse, repeat? It's really boring and still faster than actually doing the minigame. If it weren't for the XP, I'd use the unlock command on every terminal.