Ok, this is a Stargate question?

[EvilDrPuma]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

To me, the ninth chevron's purpose is to increase the amount of permutations possible to further add security.

If you know nothing of the stargates, you may not even know which chevrons need to be set. Or in what order. Hence the 9th chevron adds another multiple to the possible permutations.

 

That makes sense only if (like the Air Force) you were trying to dial a gate using your own computer and power source. A Dial Home Device automatically dials the chevrons in the correct sequence, and it seems pretty clear that the Ancients intended for a DHD to be the standard and universally available power source/operating system for a Stargate. It's just a matter of chance that DHDs have occasionally been misplaced or destroyed over the few million years since the Ancients set up the network.

[Erkenfresh]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Raven, it sounds like you'll need to write up 2 billion planets for your campaign. You might want to get started, just so you'll be preapred.

[Curufea]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

That makes sense only if (like the Air Force) you were trying to dial a gate using your own computer and power source. A Dial Home Device automatically dials the chevrons in the correct sequence' date=' and it seems pretty clear that the Ancients intended for a DHD to be the standard and universally available power source/operating system for a Stargate. It's just a matter of chance that DHDs have occasionally been misplaced or destroyed over the few million years since the Ancients set up the network.[/quote']

 

 

True. Possibly the ninth could do with the realm the Ascended currently inhabit? Although the gates were built before they had ascended....

[Badger]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Well I dont watch the show much. But, I always got the impression that some of the matches could lead to nowhere (deep space). Could narrow it down a bit. I do remember in the movie that it was 6 symbols for where you were going and then 1 symbol for where you were coming from.

[Badger]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Ahh, I see someone beat me to it. Oh well.

[EvilDrPuma]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

True. Possibly the ninth could do with the realm the Ascended currently inhabit? Although the gates were built before they had ascended....

 

Maybe. Personally, I wonder if it's just an expansion slot that never got used.

[Alverant]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I'm not an expert on the show, but if the last chevron is the point of origin, then how can there be more than 39 gates? Otherwise you'd have the same symbol for multiple points of origin.

 

Actually, why would you need to encode a point of origin at all? The gate itself is the point of origin. I'm a computer programmer IRL and one of the many things I've learned is that you don't ask the user for more information than you have to. It's just another thing they can screw up.

[sinanju]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I'm not an expert on the show, but if the last chevron is the point of origin, then how can there be more than 39 gates? Otherwise you'd have the same symbol for multiple points of origin.

 

Actually, why would you need to encode a point of origin at all? The gate itself is the point of origin. I'm a computer programmer IRL and one of the many things I've learned is that you don't ask the user for more information than you have to. It's just another thing they can screw up.

 

Quiet, you! I love the series, but there are questions into which one should not look too closely...because they don't hold up.

 

Personally, in MY mental picture of the Stargate universe, there are several big differences in how stargates work:

 

1. The "address" is the equivalent of an IP address or a cell phone number, not a physical location determined by coordinates/constellations. You dial P3X-459 and you get THAT gate and ONLY that gate, no matter where it is.

 

2. Stargates do NOT repeat NOT tear you into subatomic particles and spray you across space. They BEND SPACE so that you do, in fact, literally step across countless lightyears in a single bound.

 

3. Going along with 2 above, there is no "buffer" in which a person can be trapped.

 

4. The SGC does NOT repeat NOT give planets stupid names like P3X-459. Col. O'Neill was exactly right when he said, in response to Carter's technobabble excuse for such silly names, "Oh, well, that makes them _much_ easier to remember." (And even if they did use alphanumeric codes, you can't tell me that the grunts wouldn't hang nicknames on the planets that we viewers would overhear.)

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Why not both?

 

In other words, let's say you're correct, and a series of coordinates does correspond to a Gate in that area - 3D triangulation, which is the whole point, yeah? Yeah. Good. So why not make that the 'universally understood system' regardless of where the gate is? If you dial 215, and I have a Philly phone, then it won't matter if I'm in Philly or on Mars, so long as there's a signal tower to get me the call. So both can work.

 

Bad names are a sci-fi trope, including but not limited too "LX 409" or whatever they called the terraformed world in ALIENS. I personally thought that the Star Trek system made the MOST sense - Star, Planet by Distance. Hence we're "Sol III." Totally reasonable, and comparatively easy to remember.

 

The buffer amuses me, but I agree it's a bit hokey. I don't have a problem with being broken down and shot like an HVM, at the same time, I don't have a problem with the thing literally bending space into place and just having the trip be traumatic.

[Dr. Anomaly]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I'm not an expert on the show, but if the last chevron is the point of origin, then how can there be more than 39 gates? Otherwise you'd have the same symbol for multiple points of origin.

 

Actually, why would you need to encode a point of origin at all? The gate itself is the point of origin. I'm a computer programmer IRL and one of the many things I've learned is that you don't ask the user for more information than you have to. It's just another thing they can screw up.

Since the actual gate address is only 6 characters, and the point of origin glyph differs with each gate (and presumably then with each matching DHD) I don't see a problem as far as being limited to only 39 gates.

 

This does raise the issue, though, of mixing & matching gates and DHDs which has in fact been done in the series, and I don't offhand recall them saying anything about altering the DHD for the unique symbol on it to match the unique symbol on the gate. Then again, if the symbol that differs is always in the same place on the DHD... that may not matter.

 

I'm a programmer, too, and I've been wondering about this a bit. (Why need a "point of origin" glyph to be entered in at all?)

 

One thought that came to me was this:

 

So far, it's been "one gate per world"... and we've been told that's the way it has to work, that if there's more than one gate, one will end up "primary" and the other off-line... as was the case with the Giza gate being used at the SGC being the primary even though the Antarctic gate was on Earth at the same time. Apparently this that while the Antarctic gate had a DHD (which is supposed to make a gate primary over one that doesn't, like the SGC's Giza gate), it's DHD wasn't working correctly.

 

Now... we know the Ancients (and some of the other races still around, like the Asgard) can do things with gates that we 21st century humans can't (yet). So... that got me to wondering...

 

What if the Ancients COULD have more than one functioning gate on a world at a time if they wanted to? In that case... when you're dialing using a DHD (as the two -- gate and DHD -- don't seem to be physically connected)... how does the DHD know WHICH of the gates to send to? (Or to send the 'all coordinates entered, punch it' signal.) Well, if the last coordinate was the 'point of origin' glyph, that would uniquely identify, on a world with more than one active gate, WHICH gate the DHD was supposed to be talking to.

 

As to why it's still required when there's only 1 gate on a world?

 

Um... because the programmers didn't see the need to put in a check and then let a 6-coord address be used if there was only one gate on the world?

 

Second thought as to why:

 

If the 'point of originl glyph says "I'm done entering things" (and then the 'punch it' large red button is pressed) this could be the signal to the gate to let you enter in a longer address (such as for intergalactic transit).

 

What I mean is this:

 

Normally, you enter 6 glyphs for the desitnation, the point of origin glyph, and hit "enter".

 

Now, what if the 7th glyph you enter ISN'T the point of origin glyph? The the gate knows you're dialing "long distance" because you've not yet used the "I'm done dialing from this gate" key symbol (the point of origin glyph). Using the point of origin glyph as the 8th symbol says that you're dialing long distance, have entered the address you want, and are now ready to "punch it".

 

Thoughts?

[Cancer]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I can imagine schemes where the "point of origin" glyph is more like a "checksum" or "hash value" entry ... something that actually has no bearing on location at all, just a defense against bad data. With an intelligently-devised checksum system, for any small data set, those checksums should be unique to location.

[sinanju]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Why not both?

 

In other words, let's say you're correct, and a series of coordinates does correspond to a Gate in that area - 3D triangulation, which is the whole point, yeah? Yeah. Good. So why not make that the 'universally understood system' regardless of where the gate is? If you dial 215, and I have a Philly phone, then it won't matter if I'm in Philly or on Mars, so long as there's a signal tower to get me the call. So both can work.

 

Because the universe is just big bleeping big, is why. Most gates are going to be so far away that we can't even SEE the stars around that planet. It just doesn't make any sense to me. Plus that whole "the universe is expanding and the galaxies are turning" thing. Any race with as long-term a view of things as the Ancients would have taken that into account. No, a "phone number" or "IP address" system makes a lot more sense. IMHO. YMMV. Etc.

 

Bad names are a sci-fi trope, including but not limited too "LX 409" or whatever they called the terraformed world in ALIENS. I personally thought that the Star Trek system made the MOST sense - Star, Planet by Distance. Hence we're "Sol III." Totally reasonable, and comparatively easy to remember.

 

Stargate successfully avoided a lot other bad sci-fi tropes, so why go with this one? At the very least, they could have generated a long list names that could be easily pronounced (and remembered) and simply gone down the list, applying them to each world they successfully dialed--kind of like giving names to Hurricanes.

 

It's address P3X-459 until they get a hit. Then they look at the list and see that the next available name is "Rimmerworld." Rimmerworld it is, then. Or even--gasp!--give each planet the name used by the LOCALS they meet when they exit the Stargate. What a concept!

 

Or assign each glyph on the gate a syllable so you can string them together into a word. Then the NAME of the planet is also the ADDRESS of the planet. Makes it a lot easier to remember how to get there....

 

The buffer amuses me, but I agree it's a bit hokey. I don't have a problem with being broken down and shot like an HVM, at the same time, I don't have a problem with the thing literally bending space into place and just having the trip be traumatic.

[Curufea]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I believe the symbols change on each stargate - hence there can always be a unique point of origin symbol.

As the symbols represent constellations of stars as seen from the planet's surface (except for the point of origin symbol which is not symbolic of a constellation).

 

At least, they did in the movie.

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Dr A - the concept behind a Point of Origin, IIRC, is that you need to identify six points in space, then cross section those six points across three axes - X, Y & Z. The Point of Origin, plus another point in the distance, creates the X axis; then two parrell points above & below, left & right - thusly creating a singular point in space.

 

Is that a bit hokey? i.e., can we simply claim six points in space and dial whatever is in the middle? Yep, but I see where it made dramatic sense to have the system know a point of origin, which would reasonably allow you to build a physical 'course' - the counter being if we're dealing with machines that CUT HOLES IN SPACE then having a 'point of origin' ala mapquest is a little archaic. But I like the feel of it.

[EvilDrPuma]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I believe the symbols change on each stargate - hence there can always be a unique point of origin symbol.

As the symbols represent constellations of stars as seen from the planet's surface (except for the point of origin symbol which is not symbolic of a constellation).

 

At least, they did in the movie.

 

That's one of those things that was abandoned for the TV series. It would have been too cumbersome for SG-1 to go through the rigmarole of deciphering a whole new set of constellations on every planet before they could dial home. The series also retconned the premise that Abydos is in a far distant galaxy; to explain how it was possible to dial Abydos in the movie despite ten thousand years of stellar drift, the pilot episode placed it three hundred light years away and made it one of the closest planets to Earth in the Milky Way gate network.

 

Over the course of a few seasons, and probably inadvertently, the show did find a sort of justification for the universal glyphs--it appears that the coordinates for all gates in the Milky Way derive from constellations seen from Earth because Earth was the (adopted, it now seems) homeworld of the Ancients. We just ignore the little problem where those constellations would have changed a few million years after the Ancients set up the system. We also ignore the fact that, if all but one symbol are identical on all Stargates, there really isn't a need for a unique point-of-origin glyph on each gate.

 

The Pegasus galaxy gates on Stargate Atlantis do use "local" constellations, however--presumably as seen from the planet where Atlantis was placed. Each galaxy with a Stargate network has its own set of glyphs.

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Sounds like dialing home would be a bit of a nightmare then, eh?

[TheRavenIs]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I read this and wonder how a small question on the number of symbols has become more. I love this place.

[Dr. Anomaly]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Dr A - the concept behind a Point of Origin' date=' IIRC, is that you need to identify six points in space, then cross section those six points across three axes - X, Y & Z. The Point of Origin, plus another point in the distance, creates the X axis; then two parrell points above & below, left & right - thusly creating a singular point in space.[/quote']

Yes, I know about the 6 coordinates being points on 3 lines to define a unique location in space. But with 7 symbols in an address, and the last symbol always being the point of origin symbol for the gate you're using, I've never really been fully satisfied with any of the explainations I've seen or read.

[Dr. Anomaly]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I can imagine schemes where the "point of origin" glyph is more like a "checksum" or "hash value" entry ... something that actually has no bearing on location at all' date=' just a defense against bad data. With an intelligently-devised checksum system, for any small data set, those checksums should be unique to location.[/quote']

I've been thinking about this a lot today, and discussing it with a couple of other friends over meals and such... and the checksum may be the best solution. A bunch of the other proposals (including some I speculated about above) don't hold water, thanks to at least one pair of episodes. (Yes, I know... if something's established as canon in 99 episodes, looked at a lone divergence indicates this is fiction and they occasionally screw up, and not reality where is has to make logical sense all the time, but bear with me.)

 

At the end of season 1, SG1 was on one of a pair of ships that Apophis was brining to Earth to wipe it out. During the first episode of season 2, they manage to plant explosives that destroys one ship and sends the flaming hulk careening into the second ship, destroying it as well. Everyone except Daniel escape via a pair of Deathgliders. Daniel had been badly injured and had to be left behind. He ended up managing to get to a sarcophogus, get healed, and get to the stargate being carried on that ship and dial out just before the ship exploded.

 

Not long thereafter, he returned to the SGC, and explained to General Hammond that he'd dialed the coordinates for the Alpha Site (where personnel were being evaced to and setting up a new base). He said he realized that after the ship dropped out of hyperspace it was close enough to Earth to use Earth as a point of origin for dialing, and so he was able to escape.

 

This would seem to fit the idea of the checksum that Cancer has proposed, and would indicate that the point of origin DOES have something to do with a particular location in space... or why the necessity of using Earth's point of origin code when he was dialing?

 

This does bring up several problems, though.

 

First... since the point of origin glyph is supposed to be unique to each gate... how was Daniel able to dial Earth's point of origin symbol on a gate the presumably had its own point of origin glyph which would of course be different from the gate on Earth?

 

Also, we've seen that gates can be moved and used at new locations. (This is demonstrated in numerous episodes, not just this one in which the gate is on board a hyperspace-capable ship.) If the unique point of origin glyph is tied to a particular location in space... that's a problem for a LOT of episodes.

 

Now, I don't know the answer to this, and it's never occured to me to check: did the original gate they used (uncovered at Giza) have the SAME point of origin symbol as the gate they discovered in Anarctica? Both were "Earth" gates. If the symbols are the same, this would tend to indicate there IS something about a particular location in space that goes with a given symbol... and we run headlong into the issue of gates being moved between star systems and still being functional. If they are different, this would indicate each gate does indeed have its own unique point of origin glyph, which means the "tied to a particular location in space" would be difficult to make work as a hypothesis.

 

If they DID have different point of origin symbols, it was never mentioned in the show in on-screen dialogue. It would be easy enough to check... just watch a complete dialing sequence from any episode after they had to switch to using the Antarctic gate when the original was taken from the SGC.

 

(I suspect the symbols ARE in fact the same, for budegetary reasons. They have so many pre-canned dialing sequence shots, both of the gate and of the dialing computer display, that I can't imagine they'd redo them all just for the Antarctic gate having a different point of origin glyph -- it wouldn't be in the budget. If that's the case and the two gates DO have identical point of origin glyphs, it would seem that each WORLD has its own unique identifier, and the gate put on that world is coded with that identifier... which brings us back around to the issue of moving gates between star systems and having them still work.)

[Inu]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

2. Stargates do NOT repeat NOT tear you into subatomic particles and spray you across space. They BEND SPACE so that you do' date=' in fact, literally step across countless lightyears in a single bound.[/quote'] Yes, definitely. I would take this view as well, if I were runing. The de-rez/re-rez thing is very Trek, and very bad trek if my opinion. Bendin/warping/quantum tunnelling space is a lot more cool, in my opinion.

3. Going along with 2 above, there is no "buffer" in which a person can be trapped.

YES! Thankyou! I liked the drama in the ep, but the particular technobabble excuse was stupid. The 'event horizon' is not a separate membrane. ;.; This is as bad as Voyager detecting cracks in an event horizon. Event horizons are not physical things, or barriers, or anything, any more than the outline of a shadow is an object!

 

In my opinion, the 'buffer' was just another Trekism adopted due to the hegemonic nature of Trek writing. Same as Trek taking over every time they stepped onto the bridge of the Prometheus.

[Inu]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

(I suspect the symbols ARE in fact the same' date=' for budegetary reasons. They have so many pre-canned dialing sequence shots, both of the gate and of the dialing computer display, that I can't imagine they'd redo them all just for the Antarctic gate having a different point of origin glyph -- it wouldn't be in the budget. If that's the case and the two gates DO have identical point of origin glyphs, it would seem that each WORLD has its own unique identifier, and the gate put on that world is coded with that identifier... which brings us back around to the issue of moving gates between star systems and having them still work.)[/quote']

It's well-established that there are only two gate props -- the one in the SGC and the one they use for off-world. The off-world one is always the same gate, and it doesn't move. Any shots of a spinning inner ring is spoofed from the SGC gate. So yes, you have to step beyond what's literally shown on the gate to make things work, or, yes, you're limited to 39 gates total in the network.

[Alverant]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

I had a weird thought a few minutes ago so I haven't had time to think it through. (In other words, this could be total garbage, but when inspiration hits you have to go with it.) Instead of a coordinate system, the 7 chevrons are for a vector. So the command the stargate gives is, "I am here and I want to go in this direction, which stargate matches up?". It's not an eingen vector, the symbols are a code that allows for 3 or more stargates to be colinear. The 8th chevron is a sort of multiplier. (Or even a special code that signals, "Use the Pegasus stargate system" since there are just 2 that we know of.) The Ancients couldn't work a universal positioning system into their gates so you have to tell it were you're working from.

 

Actually the chevrons don't have to represent a coding system at all no more than gate numbers at an airport. Each address is unique to each gate. Otherwise the address you dial will be different for every planet you visit.

 

Here's another question that's been bugging me. Where does the iris go when it's open and how does it form that flower-like thing in the center?

[Yansuf]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Now, I don't know the answer to this, and it's never occured to me to check: did the original gate they used (uncovered at Giza) have the SAME point of origin symbol as the gate they discovered in Anarctica? Both were "Earth" gates. If the symbols are the same, this would tend to indicate there IS something about a particular location in space that goes with a given symbol... and we run headlong into the issue of gates being moved between star systems and still being functional. If they are different, this would indicate each gate does indeed have its own unique point of origin glyph, which means the "tied to a particular location in space" would be difficult to make work as a hypothesis.

 

I seem to recall Carter saying it had a different symbol.

[sinanju]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

Yes, definitely. I would take this view as well, if I were runing. The de-rez/re-rez thing is very Trek, and very bad trek if my opinion. Bendin/warping/quantum tunnelling space is a lot more cool, in my opinion.YES! Thankyou! I liked the drama in the ep, but the particular technobabble excuse was stupid. The 'event horizon' is not a separate membrane. ;.; This is as bad as Voyager detecting cracks in an event horizon. Event horizons are not physical things, or barriers, or anything, any more than the outline of a shadow is an object!

 

In my opinion, the 'buffer' was just another Trekism adopted due to the hegemonic nature of Trek writing. Same as Trek taking over every time they stepped onto the bridge of the Prometheus.

 

Yeah, I HATE the direction the series has gone in the last few years. What made Stargate so interesting early on was that it the humans had only ONE maguffin--the stargate itself. Otherwise, they were exploring the universe and fighting the goa'uld with contemporary weapons and tools. And the absence of spaceships made it impossible for the writers to get lazy and fall back on Trek-type cliches accumulated over the last 40 years.

 

Now, I think it's neat that they've stolen or borrowed or captured or reverse-engineered some of the ultra-tech they've encountered over the run of the series. I like that. But I hate it that the more time they spend flying around in spaceships* the more the show looks and sounds and feels like a lame rip-off of Star Trek.

 

*Even in the pilot they acknowledged that goa'uld had spaceships and could get to earth "the old fashioned way" if they had to--but that it would take months. There's a reason why everyone preferred stargates.

 

Now ATLANTIS--in another freaking galaxy--is a puny three weeks away by starship. THREE WEEKS.

[Armitage]

Re: Ok, this is a Stargate question?

 

*Even in the pilot they acknowledged that goa'uld had spaceships and could get to earth "the old fashioned way" if they had to--but that it would take months. There's a reason why everyone preferred stargates.

 

Now ATLANTIS--in another freaking galaxy--is a puny three weeks away by starship. THREE WEEKS.

 

I think the Earth ships use Asgard hyperdrives. They're Porches to the Goa'uld's VW Beetles. The Asgard live in another galaxy and have no trouble stopping in to visit Earth regularly.