communications 1. Spurious characters due to electrical
serial connection. Line noise may be induced by poor
connections, interference or
crosstalk from other circuits,
crapping on the phone wires.
2. Any chunk of data in a file or elsewhere that looks like
the results of electrical line noise.
3. Text that is theoretically a readable text or program
source but employs
syntax so bizarre that it looks like line
noise. Yes, there are languages this ugly. The canonical
example is
TECO, whose input syntax is often said to be
indistinguishable from line noise. Other non-
WYSIWYGhands of a real hacker, also qualify easily, as do
(1994-12-22)