Why is there a Point of Origin?

[Seastallion]

The one symbol is the seventh which is the PoO. The DHD's connect from time to time to calculate for drift. This info is stored in the PoO. In turn it says, I am over hear. So first six is where you are going and the seventh is the PoO saying I am over hear. So basically youa re dialing six and then six again. But the last six is just one symbol storing six symbols in it staing were you are.
I hope that made sense. I am a speaker not a writer. As you can tell.

Wrong. First you have no evidence that the location of the outgoing gate is stored in the PoO symbol. In any case, it isn't. The stargate has NO need to send its own position, it only needs to send the wormhole to the position identified by the outgoing address. We've been over this time and again. The co-relative update has NOTHING to do with telling other stargates its new position. What it DOES do, is slightly alter the represented grid position of each of the gate symbols (except for the PoO, which is seperate), so that the symbols remain valid due to stellar drift. As I've already said before, the Stargate Network works on a pan-galactic X,Y,Z coordinate grid, that allows each gate to keep its address over long periods of time, without having to change the address.

*sheesh*

Here's a visual. Maybe it will help.



Hopefully this drawing will help give folks some understanding of the whole X1, X2, Y1, Y2, Z1 and Z2 thing about the addresses (the 6 symbols in the address). It follows the map coordinate grid idea, just a little more accurately than the previous drawing above.



edit: Oops... The Blue should be Y1, and Y2. Not X. The green should be Z1 and Z2. Sorry.

[Turboz]

I think we all understand what the first 6 symbols are for SeaStallion. We all understand how this pinpoints the destination gate but that isn't what we are arguing about!

What we are trying to sort out is the POO. Incidentally I see you are onboard with my side of the theory that the POO isn't really needed to reach the destination gate. Welcome aboard!

-Turboz

[Seastallion]

I think we all understand what the first 6 symbols are for SeaStallion. We all understand how this pinpoints the destination gate but that isn't what we are arguing about!

What we are trying to sort out is the POO. Incidentally I see you are onboard with my side of the theory that the POO isn't really needed to reach the destination gate. Welcome aboard!

-Turboz

On the contrary. Rather, it is YOU that are on MY side. Keep in mind I was arguing this point long before now. Also, I'm not at all convinced that everyone actually understands what the first 6 symbols are for, because if they were the use of the PoO would not be an issue. I know very well what the debate has been about, because I've been debating it for most of the length of this thread. On my post before last, I stated exactly what the PoO is for, and does. Anything more merely complicates an uncomplicated system.

[Lock-It-In]

I'm with the crew that thinks the PoO is a hold over from the movie.

They tried to drop it with the use of DHD's. DHD's dont have the PoO glyph on them, they just have that massive central button. To the people on those worlds they might assume that gate addresses in the local group are six symbols always, and the central button just says you're done, the equivalent of the SEND/END button on a cell phone.

So to answer the question why a PoO? As someone said earlier it gave Daniel a way to solve the puzzle in the original movie. However in that movie Catherine says upon locking in the sixth symbol... "this is as far as we have ever gotten." Since there are 39 symbols on the gate, and each can only be locked in once right, there are no repeats (can't have constellations in two locations) that leaves 33. You'd think they'd have dialed the first six marked in the cartouche and then tried each of the 33 in sequence. Since the gate had 9 chevrons on it, how come their computers were set up with a program as if knowing that 7 was all they needed.

I agree there is no switchboard. The gates work more like walkie talkies than telephones. How wicked would it be if that were not the case, if they were like phones and there was some ancient switchboard that all the wormholes went through?

The bottom line is this, because stargates are fiction, they simply aren't subject to the same rules of continuity in terms of physical operation that devices in the real world are. What works in one episode doesn't work in another. In one episode we're told that a traveler in transit in a wormhole that closes on him will find himself in space, at a point between the two gates where he was upon collapse. In another we find that the receiving gate holds an object caught in the wormhole in that situation in its memory and a DHD is required to get the object out.

I'm with you guys though, sometimes I wish the writers would pay attention to the things they've already said so all us nitpickers had less to argue over like drunken poker players accusing each other of cheating.

[Seastallion]

I'm with the crew that thinks the PoO is a hold over from the movie.

They tried to drop it with the use of DHD's. DHD's dont have the PoO glyph on them, they just have that massive central button. To the people on those worlds they might assume that gate addresses in the local group are six symbols always, and the central button just says you're done, the equivalent of the SEND/END button on a cell phone.

So to answer the question why a PoO? As someone said earlier it gave Daniel a way to solve the puzzle in the original movie. However in that movie Catherine says upon locking in the sixth symbol... "this is as far as we have ever gotten." Since there are 39 symbols on the gate, and each can only be locked in once right, there are no repeats (can't have constellations in two locations) that leaves 33. You'd think they'd have dialed the first six marked in the cartouche and then tried each of the 33 in sequence. Since the gate had 9 chevrons on it, how come their computers were set up with a program as if knowing that 7 was all they needed.

I agree there is no switchboard. The gates work more like walkie talkies than telephones. How wicked would it be if that were not the case, if they were like phones and there was some ancient switchboard that all the wormholes went through?

The bottom line is this, because stargates are fiction, they simply aren't subject to the same rules of continuity in terms of physical operation that devices in the real world are. What works in one episode doesn't work in another. In one episode we're told that a traveler in transit in a wormhole that closes on him will find himself in space, at a point between the two gates where he was upon collapse. In another we find that the receiving gate holds an object caught in the wormhole in that situation in its memory and a DHD is required to get the object out.

I'm with you guys though, sometimes I wish the writers would pay attention to the things they've already said so all us nitpickers had less to argue over like drunken poker players accusing each other of cheating.

Ah, but your forgetting. "The Big Red Button" IS the PoO symbol on the stargate. Also, (as I've mentioned before) you never see the stargate spin when using the DHD to dial the gate. Why? There is no need for it to. The spinning function, AND the PoO symbol on the inner ring of the stargate is for MANUAL dialings. The reason the inner ring spins at the SGC is because they ALWAYS manually dial it. They just have a much more sophisticated way of doing it, than by hand. If the stargate doesn't have a DHD, then "The Big Red Button" can't be used to activate the gate. THAT is where the PoO symbol comes in. It tells the gate that you are done dialing. Also, (as I've said before) there exists the remote possibility that an 8 symbol address shares the exact same first 6 symbols as a 7 symbol address. If you didn't have the PoO symbol acting as an initialization function, the stargate would assume that you were finished after the first 6 symbols and activate, and you NEVER reach the extra-galactic stargate. So you see... It DOES have a purpose.

[Turboz]

Ah, but your forgetting. "The Big Red Button" IS the PoO symbol on the stargate. Also, (as I've mentioned before) you never see the stargate spin when using the DHD to dial the gate. Why? There is no need for it to. The spinning function, AND the PoO symbol on the inner ring of the stargate is for MANUAL dialings. The reason the inner ring spins at the SGC is because they ALWAYS manually dial it. They just have a much more sophisticated way of doing it, than by hand. If the stargate doesn't have a DHD, then "The Big Red Button" can't be used to activate the gate. THAT is where the PoO symbol comes in. It tells the gate that you are done dialing. Also, (as I've said before) there exists the remote possibility that an 8 symbol address shares the exact same first 6 symbols as a 7 symbol address. If you didn't have the PoO symbol acting as an initialization function, the stargate would assume that you were finished after the first 6 symbols and activate, and you NEVER reach the extra-galactic stargate. So you see... It DOES have a purpose.

Thankyou Lock-It-In - I was the one suggesting that the POO was to introduce Daniel in the movie. Glad someone agree's with me!

To everyone..

It must be asked:

Why does the ring turn on incoming connections? (OR at least it used to in the early shows) but not on other planets?

Perhaps the DHD has to identify itself on the receiving end or something?

Also, why does the stargate on an offworld planet engage as soon as the red button is pressed? - Why doesn't it wait for the ring on earths stargate to engage Chevron 7? (We all know this is a slow process).

Seems to me that there is something weird about that stargate.

-Turboz

[Seastallion]

Thankyou Lock-It-In - I was the one suggesting that the POO was to introduce Daniel in the movie. Glad someone agree's with me!

To everyone..

It must be asked:

Why does the ring turn on incoming connections? (OR at least it used to in the early shows) but not on other planets?

Perhaps the DHD has to identify itself on the receiving end or something?

Also, why does the stargate on an offworld planet engage as soon as the red button is pressed? - Why doesn't it wait for the ring on earths stargate to engage Chevron 7? (We all know this is a slow process).

Seems to me that there is something weird about that stargate.

-Turboz

The only place the inner ring is usually found spinning is at the SGC. I already explained why. They are using a computerized manual dialing system. That is why the inner ring only spins at the SGC wormhole coming in or out. It's a computer thing at the SGC causing the servos to turn, nothing more.

As to "The Big Red Button" on the DHD... IT stands in for the PoO symbol on the Stargate. It can work with any gate, so it doesn't have the unique PoO symbol that is on every gate embossed on it. If it did, it would only be useful for just the one stargate. The reason an offworld stargate doesn't wait on the SGC's gate is because it doesn't need to. None of the chevrons, PoO symbol or otherwise are locked in during incoming wormholes at the SGC.

The only thing weird about the SGC stargate, is that it doesn't have a DHD, unlike most of the stargates in the galaxy. If Earth did, it would act just like the rest of the stargates. The inner ring would never spin, and you'd use the "Big Red Button" to activate the gate, instead of locking the PoO symbol on the stargate during the computerized manual dialing sequence.

Hope that helps.

[zpm!!]

I was thinking about this while trying to answer another question. I understand the concept of having to have 7 points to plot a course, 6 for the destination and one for the origin, as explained in the movie. But why did the Ancients even have a Point of Origin?

The gate dialing is much like that of a telephone, you dial a number, and no matter where you're calling from, you will connect to the same phone. It doesn't matter where the origin is. So if the first 6 symbols give you the destination of a gate, and those symbols will connect you to the same stargate no matter where the wormhole originates from, why would you bother to even have a Point of Origin symbol? It changes nothing about the wormhole connection and only complicates the process (as seen in the movie).

Any thoughts?

point of origin is like that 1 in front of a 1-800-563-3222. national code. area code is the 3 digits before your address, think of the 1 as a point of origin,
so 1 is point of origin.

*,*,*,*,*,*,1
*,*,*,*,*,*,*,1
and the point of origin is last!
milkyway galaxy, 38 symbols, so it's like are telephone, 10 digits just more. area code is defined by how long your address is. we could possibily have a 9 and 10 digit address! idk, but it's poss.

[Lock-It-In]

This is a bit off topic, but it relates to the spinning dial...

Have you noticed that in some episodes, the receiving gate has chevrons that light up in the same order and presumably at the same time that they're being dialed (or pressed on the DHD) on the sending gate.

The most clear example of this I can think of is in the third Season SG-1 episode "New Ground" when an archaeologist uncovers the gate and he is arguing with his assistant/girlfriend about what it is and we see one of the chevrons lock. He is shocked, so is she (rightly so), and they continune to argue, "We should run"... "No way this is too cool to run from let's find out what's happening" meanwhile another chevron locks in. It continues to happen very slowly. The scene cuts to earth where carter talks about how she's redialing a gate she tried earlier but couldn't get a lock on. Because the chevrons on the receiving planet lock in slowly it is implied that the time in between them lighting up is the same as it takes SGC to dial them, slowly with the automatic-manual method.

Here is my question... how does the receiving gate know it's the receiving gate until all of the symbols are in? Even though the wormhole isn't open, the chevrons still light up, pre-kawoosh.

That's the equivalent of looking at your caller ID, and seeing the caller's phone number come up one digit at a time and then when he dials the last one, your phone rings.

The Atlantis gate shows all the chevrons lock in sequence very fast for an incoming wormhole.

Of course I think the real world answer is that having the chevrons in "New Ground" Light up slowly on the receiving end, it heightens dramatic tension as the two people who've never seen anything like it argue and watch, waiting for something to happen.

Can anyone think of any other time the receiving gate seems to know it's the the receiving gate before the dialing is completed?

The only acceptable answer I can come up with within the science of the show is that there is a time delay naturally between dialling and connecting. That both wormholes dont open at exactly the same time, and that when the dialling is completed it takes as long as the dialling took to open the the receiving gates end. Objects can still enter the sending end and zip along inside the wormhole as it forms. Since space and time are really the same thing, distorting space to create the wormhole has to distort time at least somewhat right?

I'm curious to know my fellow I-think-too-much-about-this-stuff people's opinions.

[Seastallion]

point of origin is like that 1 in front of a 1-800-563-3222. national code. area code is the 3 digits before your address, think of the 1 as a point of origin,
so 1 is point of origin.

*,*,*,*,*,*,1
*,*,*,*,*,*,*,1
and the point of origin is last!
milkyway galaxy, 38 symbols, so it's like are telephone, 10 digits just more. area code is defined by how long your address is. we could possibily have a 9 and 10 digit address! idk, but it's poss.

Mmm. Not really. The "1" doesn't activate your phone. It is just another 'designation' number in where to place the call. It has more in common with one of the 'regular' gate symbols, than the point of origin. It would be more like the 7th symbol in an 8 symbol address. The phone system has no direct co-relation with the 'Point of Origin'. The point of origin is like the 'trigger', to a howitzer. You enter the cordinates into the stargate to direct the aim of the wormhole; once the proper cordinates are set, then you activate the trigger, or the 'PoO' symbol. POW..!!!

[Daryl Froggy]

1) Yes the dialling gate knows where it is SO why does it need the POO at all

The same reason you need to tell a computer to stop running a program when it seems obvious to us that it is at an end, the gate doesn't know that you are done dialing until you give it the symbol that represents the planet you are dialing from.

I think that is pretty much self evident after all the gate is just a big computer with a wormhole as its output.

[_Owen_]

I don't know if you've sorted this out but I'll post anyways. The reason you don't need a point of origin on a phone is because the phones connect with wires, there is only one possible path for the electric current until it gets to a switchboard in which case the signals tell the switchboard where to signals are going to go, with a limited number of choices you don't need to know where you are coming from to get there.

The main reason though is this: normally Stargates require six points to locate another Stargate now in my opinion there is other information contained somewhere within the gate network, specifically information concerning the orbit of the planet, this way the Stargate can identify an entire area, namely the orbit of the planet, in which it knows the stargate will be located, then the wormhole can be close enough to jump to the gate. But why, you ask, do we need to identify an area when we can just identify the stargate itself. Well contrary to popular belief planets do move, and they move pretty quickly, if we were to try to identify something the size of a stargate, while the planet is orbiting a star and rotating by the time we were done dialing the sequence would be incorrect, because the gate would have moved out of that area or away from that point. Either the dialing sequence would have to reset the symbols, or the locations that the symbols represent would have to be altered which means the correlative update program would have to be running constantly on every gate making it impossible to dial in anyways. (Now are you catching on?)

If we aren't allowed to find other gates using one symbol, how can we find ours? That is why we need a point of origin, when you push that seventh symbol it automatically updates, it represents, for that moment, a point representing the location of the Stargate allowing for the dialing sequence to be completed.

Now yes, I have gone and answered the question scientifically, that is why we physically need a point of origin, but yes, we could do without. The Stargate could automatically update its location, but that would make it so diffcult to understand how it works... one possibility is that the Ancients fully expected that eventually other races would learn to use the Stargates and maybe they wanted to help them. How did we figure out what the Stargate did? Does anyone remember the movie, Dr. Jackson and the cube of doom? The whiteboard? Seven symbols to plot a course? Perhaps that is why they did it. Or maybe they just liked being organized, maybe they liked having everything separated and drawn out and organized. I like to keep my computer organized, I have folders for everything, if I wasn't so lazy, my computer would be the auora of neatness. But do I actually need separate subfolders for my music and for my videos? Or how about my documents and my websites? Now I could very easily have everything jammed onto my desktop, but I don't. What if you weren't human if you were something else, and you saw my computer and asked me why do you have all those folders? You don't need them, you can have anything right there on your desktop. Does that sound familliar at all? Why do I have all these folders? Why do the stargates need seven chevrons? Maybe they just liked to be organized.

[Turboz]

At last, Lock-IT-In understands my way of thinking.

I also have a funny thing about the ring and chevron timing.

IE SG1 on a offworld planet punch in earths co-ordinates as quick as they can while they're under enemy fire. The gates chevrons light up instantly as each button is pressed. The wormhole is formed instantly when the red button is pressed.

Meanwhile back on earth.... The ring is still spinning slowly until each chevron engages manually. So what happens to SG1 who have already finished dialling and jumped into the wormhole? - Does this mean they get caught up in "Space-Lag"?

Does the transmitting gate hold them in it's buffer until the gate on earth accepts the transmission?

I'd like to see SeaStallion's answer to this... He seems to have all the answers!

-Turboz

[_Owen_]

I know it's directed towards Seastallion but I'll take it.

I have noticed that when there is an incoming wormhole the gate just activates, there is no spinning. This seems logical because while the gate is dialing it doesn' have the location to which to send information, so it couldn't make the gate dial at the same time. Also, the wormhole couldn't establish if the gate was still dialing. Theoretically, nothing would need to be done on the imcoming gate's end except accept (pun intended). The reason we see the rings on the incoming gate's dialing is mostly incontinuity and oversight/not caring by the producers.

[Artha O'neill]

I was thinking about this while trying to answer another question. I understand the concept of having to have 7 points to plot a course, 6 for the destination and one for the origin, as explained in the movie. But why did the Ancients even have a Point of Origin?

The gate dialing is much like that of a telephone, you dial a number, and no matter where you're calling from, you will connect to the same phone. It doesn't matter where the origin is. So if the first 6 symbols give you the destination of a gate, and those symbols will connect you to the same stargate no matter where the wormhole originates from, why would you bother to even have a Point of Origin symbol? It changes nothing about the wormhole connection and only complicates the process (as seen in the movie).

Any thoughts?

I know this is a bit off topic, but In SGA, " The Hive", Mckay dailed to Atlantis but he did without knowing the PoO of the planet he was on.

sorry again, but did anyone else notice this?