Glitches

Glitches are brief, unexpected deviations from expected operation in a system. They are usually transient and may be reproducible only under certain conditions, and they can occur in software, hardware, or signal processing. In common usage, glitches are distinct from permanent defects or deliberate features, as they often resolve on their own or with minor intervention.

Glitches arise in many domains, including computer software, electronic circuits, telecommunications, and multimedia. In video games and digital media, glitches can produce unusual visuals or sounds, sometimes becoming recognizable phenomena. In art, glitch aesthetics embrace such irregularities as intentional effects.

Common causes include timing errors and race conditions in software, memory corruption, hardware faults such as bit flips, buffering or synchronization failures, faulty input data, and external interference. Rarely, physical radiation can flip bits in memory, causing soft errors.

Manifestations vary: visual glitches may appear as screen tearing, artifacts, color shifts, or corrupted images; audio glitches as pops, crackles, or stuttering; data glitches as corrupted files or unexpected program behavior.

Mitigation involves robust design, testing, error detection and correction, redundancy, checksums, and watchdog mechanisms. In practice, glitches can reveal weaknesses but also inspire innovation, such as glitch art and experimental game design.