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{{trope}}
[[File:
'''Tech Guy:''' I'm on it... According to this, this particular model of wall is of an excellent quality. It doesn't creak. ''Unless... there's a body behind it''.|''[http://theslackerz.com/index.php?nav{{=}}Comic&Page{{=}}26 Slackerz]'' making fun of ''[[CSI]]''}}▼
▲{{quote|'''Horatio''': I need a report on ''all the walls ever made ever''.<br />
▲'''Tech Guy:''' I'm on it... According to this, this particular model of wall is of an excellent quality. It doesn't creak. ''Unless... there's a body behind it''.|''[http://theslackerz.com/index.php?nav=Comic&Page=26 Slackerz]'' making fun of ''[[CSI]]''}}
A special [[Applied Phlebotinum]] used primarily in [[Police Procedural]] dramas.
No matter what sort of clue the Crime Scene lab has found (blood, wire, rope, oil, perfume, etc), ''somebody'' has manufactured a database designed to search through them all. Not only that, our heroes at the crime lab have purchased a copy of this software, the interface devices to input the data in question and have acquired the expertise to use this software (which has so far never been used in another one of their cases) with 100% accuracy on the first attempt.
It should be noted that some of these "
A key aspect of this trope is that there must be a pre-existing compendium of all possible samples of whatever is being identified. In [[Real Life]], forensics can indeed match samples of, say, paint or glass not only down to manufacturer but even to a specific batch, but this requires two samples: one sample from evidence, and another sample to compare against. This also means that in real forensics, the implications of this evidence are different; while crime dramas typically use the
Forensics labs also have an [[Hand Wave|out]] for many of these
Magical Databases almost always have a [[Viewer
See [[Akashic Records]] for a related but [[Older Than Feudalism|older]] trope.
{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==
* Inspector Runge from ''[[Monster (
* The titular character of ''[[
* Somewhat justified in the ''[[Ghost in
== Comic Books ==
* Almost every depiction of [[
* ''[[The Flash]]'': Impulse is the only Flash able to permanently remember what he reads at super-speed. Once, he read ''an entire San Francisco public library''. It came in less handy than you'd think.
* In ''[[The Sandman]]'', Dream has a library of all the books that were never written. Including some famous real-world classics whose authors [[Author Existence Failure|died before they could finish writing them.]] It also has the books that you might dream of writing some day. Trippy.
* Subverted in ''[[
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* ''[[The Bourne Identity]]''
** The US government can identify a German citizen and everything she's done her entire life and her family history within moments from a blurry picture.
* In the 2008 film ''[[Iron Man (
** This increases in Magic when you realize that the only justification for this would be that Stane somehow already had it translated, a process which likely took some time - a believable handwave, given the level of technology Stark surrounds himself with. But, as an earlier scene showed, ''Stane is fluent in several of the Ten Rings' spoken languages''.
* Subverted in ''[[Mr. and Mrs. Smith]]'': When the eponymous female character commands her subordinates to "search the database!", she gets rebutted with a snarky "For what? ''John Smith''?"
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* ''[[Lord Peter Wimsey]]'' series: Wimsey is a living magical database. He also had a home-made "Who's Who" of the underworld, and once managed to identify the maker of a hat which had had its label removed, purely from the style. (Parker remarks that if he hadn't got the hatter, they'd have tried him on the man's dress suit, similarly de-labelled.)
* ''[[Discworld]]'' series
** Death's library in sometimes functions like a
** Hex does this as well since he is basically a sentient, magical computer. As long as he has his teddy bear he'll find out what you want to know.
* ''[[The Dresden Files]]''
** The Archive in is a being that holds the knowledge of everything ever written down, ever, in the history of mankind.
** There's also Bob, Harry's knowledge spirit in a skull. Bob doesn't have the extensive knowledge of the Archive, but he is Dresden's go-to guy for magical knowledge, and he instinctively knows the current rules of magic.
* ''[[Secret Histories|The Secret Histories]]'': The Karma Catechist is a living database of every spell, ritual and magical concept conceivable in his universe.
== Live Action TV ==
* ''[[CSI]]'' is the king of the
** And yes, there actually ''is'' a national clown registry to prevent identical makeup.
** Amusingly subverted in one episode where Greg is disappointed to learn that there is no hotdog database
** The software/database that allows one to find where a picture in New York was taken by measuring the skyline in comparison to a reference height (while the technique is sound, there is no such software).
** However, one episode shows them using [https://web.archive.org/web/20090926235612/http://livelabs.com/photosynth/ Photosynth].
** In fact, it's when CSI avoids the trope that it can be jarring. A reoccurring scene is the local trace evidence guy naming a compound, and the CSI identifying the compound's common name, and its uses, including the more arcane (say,
** There actually are multiple shoe-print databases available to police. An episode of ''[[True Crime|Cold Case Files]]'' discussed a murder case that was solved, thanks to a partial shoe-print on a piece of glass that matched the shoes of a person in the neighborhood, who was found to be the killer.
** The characters in CSI are also lucky that whatever sample of fabric or metal they find, there is always some unique element or polymer in it which is used by a single company in the world, and is located a short car drive away. Did we forget to mention that the magical database knows the exact 100% correct composition of everything you can buy?
* A
** On ''[[Law and Order SVU]]'', they often query some supposed national database implied to consist in all sex crime reports recorded by all local precincts throughout the entire country. They also have Warner, whose mind occasionally acts as a virtual
* ''[[Star Trek]]'': The franchise must hold the freakin' copyright on the
** Data can calculate the probability of a successful saucer section separation at high-warp in mere seconds, even though it's never been attempted before.
** Spock can calculate the equations for time travel '''and''' memorize Hamlet ''in the same movie''.
** The holodeck can recreate any setting or fictional story known to Man and several other species. (In one of the books, the holodeck can even replay every Opera performance from 1400 to the year 2356. How they managed to record pre-Renaissance operas ... best not to ask. But there's a reason the Federation Time Police look so harried when we see them -- and it's not just Kirk.)
*** The holodeck could get its own section of this trope.
**** At one point, Picard commands the holodeck to recreate a specific date and time in a Parisian café, complete with accurate interactive portrayals of everyone who was present in the café at the time, in order to relive a memory on a whim. His subsequent disgust at himself for doing so clearly indicates this is not a holodeck program he'd built himself - the data already existed in the computer.
** The Enterprise Main Computer carries all kinds of info like the launch codes to the Voyager probe built over 200 years earlier, or the command codes to every other Federation ship. And yet, when it would actually be useful for the computer to find a piece of obscure information, such as in
** One episode of ''TNG'', "The Chase", had an intersection of two of these. The computer needed to do a very complex calculation involving genetic code and the locations of planets in the distant past. It would take several hours, and both the Federation, the Klingons, and the Cardassians agreed to view the results simultaneously. The Klingon commander, in the interim, tried to persuade Data to do so much faster, basically saying that Data is even more powerful than the ship's incredibly powerful computer.
* ''[[NCIS]]''
** Abby, the forensic scientist, tells us that her ex-boyfriend has made a database of databases after using a magic database of the measures of car fronts.
** A database of turkey DNA comes in to play.
** This trope was lampshaded with:
{{quote|
**They also regularly catch spies by comparing their facial features to records. As if spies were celebrities sort of like sports stars and opponents would not be at pains to [[Captain Obvious|keep the identity of spies obscure]] and could not disguise facial features in any event.
* ''[[Torchwood (TV)|Torchwood]]'''s main characters are a secret organization with nationwide database records sorted by an ancient alien computer system. The team is capable of literally [[Retcon|retconning]] anything by changing the database. ▼
***Even sillier, they sometimes call Interpol to ID a spy. As if Interpol would do that. Setting aside the fact that they are a ''police'' organization, not an intelligence agency, no government would provide them any information if they did.
▲* ''[[
** ''Torchwood'' also subverted it once - just as Jack and Toshiko are getting ready to search every database they have, Owen announces that he's already found the man they're looking for. He was listed in the phone book.
* On ''[[
** Curiously averted, though, in a third-season episode in which Lilah Morgan has to dig through cabinets of files to find information on Angel.
* ''[[Painkiller Jane]]'': This is almost the entire purpose of Riley's
* ''[[John Doe]]'' features a hero that displays ability of knowing everything that can be known about on earth. He's basically a walking and talking magical database.
** Actually, he knows everything about everything ''except'' himself.
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* And similar to John Doe, there's Kyle, from ''[[Kyle XY]]'', who didn't know ''every'' trivial fact, only things like mathematical formulas. Well, until he spent a single day reading the World Book.
** More literally, it is revealed that {{spoiler|Kyle possesses the entire Zzyzx database in his mind}}.
* ''[[Blake's
* ''[[
** The Doctor is a living
** And then there's
** The episode of the new series "Midnight" averts this somewhat. The 10th Doctor had no idea what the enemy was or how to fight it.
** It's worth mentioning that he IS over nine hundred years old, and putting everything we've seen on-screen together would make about one-hundredth of his life.
* ''Spooks'' - well, maybe it's magic, or maybe [[MI 5]] really ''can'' do that stuff...
* ''[[Chuck]]'' is a walking-talking database, able to identify terrorists on sight, however there is also such a database under the Orange Orange used by Sarah and Casey. In "Chuck vs. Santa Claus" we see it pulls up the record of "Ned" who has no criminal record, and is listed as [[Viewer
** It doesn't seem too farfetched since getting married in a legal sense requires a marriage license. And since in the US, being married grants several benefits in things like taxes, martial status is generally a standard appearance on many forms.
* Ziggy from ''[[Quantum Leap]]'' not only apparently has records of the minutiae of decades' worth of the day-to-day activities of pretty much everyone who was alive at the same time as Sam Beckett, but can also calculate the probability that Sam's interference in history will have the desired effect. And regardless of the percentage calculated, Ziggy is always right. Except for a couple episodes where despite an abnormally high percentage, Sam just "knows" he has to do something else. The times when Sam "knows" he has to do something else also are ones where all signs point to Al misleading or outright lying to Sam because of ulterior motives.
** One episode has Hal using Ziggy to help Sam set up an ambush on a man walking around a corner, complete with a precise countdown. Apparently Ziggy has recordings of every human being's movements everywhere ever down to the second.
* ''E-Ring'' had an example in the episode ''The General''. Said general is kidnapped in Spain. In order to identify his kidnapper, the main character asks to consult the ''Voice'' Database of the Spanish Government (which apparently includes voice samples of each of the [[Nineteen Eighty-Four|40 million citizens of the country]] and is [[Fridge Logic|regularly updated]] to match voice changes due to aging, disease or plain mood swings), and then uses an experimental, [[America Saves the Day|American exclusive application]] to compare its files with the record of the kidnapper's voice he has. This leads to the obvious question of why on Earth would a government keep a voice database of all its citizens if it had no way of consulting it.
* In an episode of ''[[Judging Amy]]'', the DNA identifying computer with a database of known criminals returned a result of... ''cat DNA''! Which actually justified. Its not that uncommon to stumble upon Animal DNA (Pets, Strays etc.) on a Crimescene so checking for the right number of chromosomes and some markers makes sense before you go onto a useless orgy of comparing datasets to a nonsensical sample.
* ''[[Dexter]]''
** An episode had Dexter identifying an STD in some bloodwork, then going into the Florida STD Database to find the names of people afflicted with that
** Subverted with Trinity. His DNA is collected halfway through the season but it can't be used to identify him because he has no criminal record and isn't in the database.
* An episode of the ''[[
** It does explain that it learns this {{spoiler|by hacking into and reading him emails. Less magic database, more magic scanner.}}
* ''[[Castle]]'':
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** It's memorably subverted in a first season episode, when Beckett says they'll need to look someone up in the missing persons' database- a bunch of paper folders.
** The man from [[The Men in Black]] in one episode has a database in a suitcase. It ''instantly'' pinpoints a man's location by using his cellphone then automatically finds a [[Magical Security Camera]] in the area and maps a small part of the man's face onto a model, extrapolates the rest of his face from that, and pops up with an identity. Castle and Beckett as surprisingly unphased by the technology.
* David of ''[[Wishbone]]'' apparently has access to a database of dog breeds that includes things like their jaw measurements, for some reason. It has a very '90s aesthetic to it, like an over-the-top hacker-movie interface run on an old Macintosh OS.
* Alcatraz has a database in their Bat Cave that can find, in seconds, a complete map of all private bomb shelters built in the 1960s by a company that went out of business decades ago.
== Radio ==
* The titular book of ''[[The
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* In ''[[Grand Theft Auto IV]]'', the criminal dispatching minigame starts by looking up a perp from a stolen cop car's laptop. This gives an exact, updating location of the criminal for you to chase down.
* In ''[[Kingdom Hearts]] 2'', Sora seems to think that Ansem's computer is one of these. Because the computer belonging to the guy you killed last year will have info on where your friends are right now, right?
* Patchouli Knowledge (It's ''[[Meaningful Name|in her name]]'', duh!) of ''[[Touhou]]'' fame is an effective Human([[Witch Species|oid]]) Magical Database, thanks to her centuries of study and self-made [[Library of Babel]]. In ''Subterranean Animism'', she is capable of spilling out the histories and powers of every [[Youkai]] Marisa meets in her adventure... with the slight problem of taking until ''after'' the yokai was defeated to look up any relevant information.
** She also applied her knowledge to other tasks, such as constructing a spaceship from plywood, [[Duct Tape for Everything|duct tape]], and a whole lot of [[Functional Magic]].
** To push the point home, the only character who probably trumps her in intelligence might be Eirin Yagokoro, the Brain of the Moon. Very few humans know anything significant about the advanced Lunarian society and their technology (for their own protection, to some extent). In ''Silent Sinner In Blue'', Patchouli not only makes remarkably accurate predictions regarding the timing of their rocket's flight to get to the Lunar Capital but she also immediately identifies the Lunar Veil, a Lunarian device that allows flawless travel between the Earth and Moon, that Eirin had covertly attached to the rocket. The ever-collected Eirin's first thought is ''stab this person now''.
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== Western Animation ==
* From a Western Animation: From ''[[Jem]]'' episode, "In Search of the Stolen Album" in which Synergy, Jem's super-computer is able to scan clues that "Misfits"'s treasure hunt joke on the Holograms in a matter of
* [[Teen Genius|Wade]] from ''[[Kim Possible]]'' has more or less everything in the database, which of course comes in handy very often. Somewhat justified that he is a highly skilled hacker using [[Rapid
{{reflist}}
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[[Category:Information Desk]]
[[Category:Magical Database]]
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