2014-04-26 10:52:28 -04:00
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spike
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2014-04-26 11:54:15 -04:00
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v. 1. To defeat a selection mechanism by introducing a (sometimes temporary)
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device that forces a specific result. The word is used in several
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industries; telephone engineers refer to spiking a relay by inserting a pin
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to hold the relay in either the closed or open state, and railroaders refer
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to spiking a track switch so that it cannot be moved. In programming
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environments it normally refers to a temporary change, usually for testing
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purposes (as opposed to a permanent change, which would be called hardwired
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). 2. [borderline techspeak] A visible peak in an otherwise rather constant
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graph (e.g. a sudden surge in line voltage, an unexpected short high on a
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logical line in a circuit). Hackers frequently use this for a sudden short
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increase in some quantity such as system load or network traffic.
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