Question - How does changing the order of the first 6 symbols affect an address because surely it shouldn't make any difference? Fa6ade 16:41, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
- It would be the same as changing the order of the numbers in your phone number.—Anubis 10545 18:33, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
- No because its not the same, a phone number generally has nothing to do with your actual address (excluding area code) whilst a gate address corresponds to 6 constellations which provide a rough triangulated position so mixing them up shouldn't make a difference as they should all point to the same place. I know Mckay comments about putting the address backwards and forwards in (SGA: "The Brotherhood") but I don't see how that works either.Fa6ade 20:58, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
- Remember that the 6 points are used to form 3 lines through space, the destination being located where they intersect. Let's say the address is ABCDEF, then the lines formed are AB, CD, and EF. If we instead decide to dial ACEBDF, then we have the lines AC, EB, and DF - these are three different lines and thus their intersection (assuming they intersect at 1 point) is a different location. What it boils down to is that each set of 6 symbols can be used to identify up to 15 distinct points in space. Since it's much more difficult to think in 3-d than 2-d, I made a 2-d illustration of it located here: i429.photobucket.com/albums/qq11/Statisturin/Random/StargateExample.jpg —QuicksilverTurin12 00:07, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
- The most obvious explanations would be either that each constellation symbol represents just one star within that constellation (such as the alpha stars, or some key star indicated by a subtlety in the symbol), or that the symbol represents the centre formed by the set of stars within the constellation.
- As for the issue of how the six symbols represent a location that depends on the order, the explanation given by QuicksilverTurin12 doesn't make sense, as lines are in no way guaranteed to intersect in 3D at all, and as such most combinations would be obviously invalid as their lines wouldn't intersect. But alternate explanations could work. For instance, if you interpret it as a sequence of lines, but the method of calculating position is more complex than just "where they intersect", it becomes much more sensible. Alternatively, if you interpret the constellation "points" of four of the symbols to be lines drawn from earth to that constellation's centre, then you define with four lines a "line" pretty much anywhere in the sky... and then the last two would become a way to represent the distance. This would give the "point of origin" a significance of sorts. 124.171.156.135 14:32, July 24, 2010 (UTC)
- I don't recall suggesting that the lines must necessarily intersect. The question was how changing the order of the symbols can affect the address: I answered the question, and gave a diagram to illustrate how it is possible. Changing the sequence of chevrons changes the 'intended destination', if the lines don't intersect, or if there's no Stargate at that location, then you won't get a connection. I wasn't trying to put forth a Complete Theory on Gate Addressing, just show possibility, that means I can take a few liberties. :) The fact that the lines don't necessarily intersect (or come sufficiently close to intersecting or whatever precise method might be the case) doesn't really contradict my explanation - it simply explains why random dialing is ineffective. Carter mentioned at one point that they tried what - Hundreds? Thousands? - of permutations without establishing another connection, it'd be because those lines don't all 'intersect'. QuicksilverTurin12 (talk) (Contribs) 01:57, September 20, 2010 (UTC)
- Concerning the intersecting lines, I believe most people interpret that principle discovered by Daniel Jackson (and the diagram which he drew, originally by Amelius, seen in his notebook in The Ark of Truth) incorrectly. As it was pointed out, obviously the set of 3 (or even 2) lines drawn through space are in no way guaranteed to intersect at the same point, if at all. Rather, the points A and B, C and D, E and F each define an axial plane—the minimum and maximum coordinate on each axis, in other words the faces of the bounding box; those large cubes shown in the pictures—they're there for a reason. :) The destination coordinates are then computed as the center of that bounding box. The lines in the diagram are there to show that the destination is equidistant from each face of the bounding box. The lines drawn from the center of each face to the center of the opposite face will obviously all intersect at the same point, which is the center of the bounding box. Each glyph indeed represents a point in space—but depending on its position in the address, it may represent only the X coordinate, only the Y coordinate, or only the Z coordinate (or ρ, φ and θ if you prefer—because it is more appropriate to use the spherical rather than Cartesian coordinates in mostly spherical or cylindrical galaxies, where most of the stellar motion is about the galactic center), and it can specify either a minimum or a maximum for each in the calculation. This explains how the Ancients came up with an address system which can represent any habitable planet in a galaxy, with reasonable accuracy, using just under 40 discrete reference points. Better yet, the addresses and the reference points are probably selected in such a way as to negate (as much as possible) the effects of stellar drift and universe expansion at the intended destination; because each of the reference points (glyphs) is moving through space with its own velocity depending on its distance from the galactic core, each of the 3 pairs of glyphs in the address not only code the destination's position on each coordinate axis, but also (roughly) its velocity along that axis; in this way, although AB and BA as the first pairs in a gate address would represent the same coordinate on a given axis, reversing the glyphs could for example have the effect of flipping the velocity vector on that axis. To a degree, this explains how the Stargate network managed to remain operational, with largely intact addresses, without much maintenance for 50 million years, for example allowing Earth's Stargate to dial Abydos without a working DHD after millennia of disuse.
- Also note that the point of origin representation, being just one point, is lacking this redundancy inherent in the representation for destination, which renders the gate unusable if removed from its original location until it can be recalibrated for its new location; some spacecraft, such as Atlantis and Klorel's Hatak, have Stargates on board, but they cannot be used while the ship is in motion. —141.158.115.19 07:29, November 12, 2010 (UTC)
Question - Is it ever stated what the seventh symbol actually represents when dialing another galaxy? And for the ninth symbol, is there any canon explanation other then it just being a code for a specific gate? 85.247.133.91 01:25, November 7, 2009 (UTC)
- As I recall, Carter or Daniel said that the extra symbol was a distant calculation or something. In my opinion it just acts as an area code so that you don't have to confine all gate addresses in the universe to six symbols. So essentially the seventh symbol is which galaxy it is. For the 9th symbol thing, the point was that it had to be the point of origin but Destiny was only meant to be dialed from Earth as a security feature. However, so that it could be dialed from elsewhere the ancient set the gates so if you dialed the last chevron as Earth's point of origin it would work. Fa6ade (talk) (Contribs) 22:55, November 8, 2009 (UTC)
- I don't wanna analyze it too much, but wouldn't the same six symbols lead to the same point in space, unless there are identical constellation in other galaxies, in identical configurations? And the "code" for destiny, how could a gate an Icarus have both the Icarus point of origin, AND the earth point of origin on the same gate? OMacaco (talk) (Contribs) 12:18, November 13, 2009 (UTC)
- Destiny's address is a code, that uses specific set of 8 symbols, after which the gate must be force fed/spoofed/tricked to use the Earth's Point of Origin. Or to say Icarus gate has only Icarus' point of origin, but the combination of Dialling Computer and DHD allows them to trick the gate to think that it'd dialling from Earth and uses it's Point of Origin. —Supakillaii (talk) (Contribs) 16:21, July 24, 2010 (UTC)
- I don't wanna analyze it too much, but wouldn't the same six symbols lead to the same point in space, unless there are identical constellation in other galaxies, in identical configurations? And the "code" for destiny, how could a gate an Icarus have both the Icarus point of origin, AND the earth point of origin on the same gate? OMacaco (talk) (Contribs) 12:18, November 13, 2009 (UTC)
I have been thinking about the nine chevron address. Like it is stated in SGU that address isn't a place marked by six chevron and the seventh as point of origin but rather is a code to a specific Gate in that case the gate on board of destiny. Sow what if all gates that exist have a specific 9 chevron address just for them connecting only to them regardless of there position? That would be a very good explanation why all gates have nine chevron and not just the one from earth from which the ancient planed to dial to destiny
- All gates have nine chevrons because the Ancients didn't phase it out after they abandoned the Destiny project. —Supakillaii (talk) (Contribs) 09:03, October 4, 2010 (UTC)
- I doubt all gates have 9 chevron addresses - but I bet more do than just Destiny. Someone said on an article that when Destiny dials Earth, it uses nine chevrons - which is possible as Earth now uses the Antarctic gate which is the original Ancient one. Any Ancient ship with a gate would have to give it a nine-chevron address - and I bet a lot of outposts have them too, they're just not often used. Sman789 (talk) (Contribs) 14:21, October 4, 2010 (UTC)
- Tau'ri use the Alpha Gate on Tau'ri, not the Beta gate. —Supakillaii (talk) (Contribs) 15:45, October 4, 2010 (UTC)
- I doubt all gates have 9 chevron addresses - but I bet more do than just Destiny. Someone said on an article that when Destiny dials Earth, it uses nine chevrons - which is possible as Earth now uses the Antarctic gate which is the original Ancient one. Any Ancient ship with a gate would have to give it a nine-chevron address - and I bet a lot of outposts have them too, they're just not often used. Sman789 (talk) (Contribs) 14:21, October 4, 2010 (UTC)
Just a question: when it was said, the pegasus dhds were the only ones, which cant dial more than 7 glyphs? Im pretty sure the milky way dhds are also incapable of dialing gates in other galaxies, especial since they are technological inferior to pegasus dhds. All stargates need assistance from a system that can calculate extragalactic adresses, like a control crystal, an asgard device or a modified sgc-dialing computer to perform such a task. I just changed this article. --SG-27 (talk) (Contribs) 19:59, October 3, 2011 (UTC)