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