Magical Database: Difference between revisions

[[File:acmagicdatabase_6793acmagicdatabase 6793.png|link=Axe Cop|frame|He also has a file of maps to bad guy labs.]]

It should be noted that some of these "[[Magical Database|magical databases]]" actually exist, and ''are'' in use by various agencies, though they aren't quite as stunningly accurate or omniscient as the [[Police Procedural]] suggests. In real life, "Data Mining" is a time-consuming task that has to be practiced. Does each agency host a different server? Which ones pull from each other? Are all servers identical? Are there delays in updating the databases? These are all questions the searcher needs to be aware of, and there is no single database that stores 100% of the information.

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 [['''Magical Database]]''' to find a new lead from trace evidence, real forensics usually confirms identity after the police have already gotten a lead (i.e. the police already suspect the glass came from the suspect's house or workplace and can prove it by comparing them, as opposed to identifying where the suspect lives with no prior knowledge just from the glass sample).

Forensics labs also have an [[Hand Wave|out]] for many of these [[Magical Database|'''magical databases]]''', since it's generally believable that they would have a database of common murder weapons or components of weapons.

** Death's library in sometimes functions like a [[Magical Database]], instantly delivering books on very obscure subjects when he requests them, or writing out fresh text if his query doesn't require a long answer (the "some of the sheep" response from ''The Last Continent'').

* ''[[CSI]]'' is the king of the [[Magical Database]]. They have demonstrated databases on blood, hair, rope, wire, shoe prints, tire treads, tire rubber compositions, and even clown makeup patterns. There was a [[Lampshade Hanging]] in a sixth season episode, in which a character sarcastically suggested searching a database to discover the brand of a hot dog.

* A [[Magical Database]] is often an implicit background element of investigations in all the [[Law and Order|Law & Order]] series. Although they have used such databases for many of the same types of queries as in ''[[CSI]]'', the database query itself is more often carried out off-screen, with a lab analyst mentioning that a fiber found at the crime scene matches a luxury brand of purse that is only sold in only three stores in New York City.

** 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 [[Magical Database]].

* ''[[Star Trek]]'': The franchise must hold the freakin' copyright on the [[Magical Database]] cause there are like 1500 of them in the series and movies.

* ''[[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|retconningretcon]]ning anything by changing the database.

* ''[[Painkiller Jane]]'': This is almost the entire purpose of Riley's character -- tocharacter—to run the computers that have access to these things.

** The Doctor is a living [[Magical Database]]. For more recent incarnations, there isn't a single episode in the new or old series where he met an alien, visited a planet, or saw a piece of technology he hadn't seen, invented, or met previously. In the new series, when a bunch of alien cops threaten him and Donna in a language not even the mighty TARDIS can translate he easily understands and berates them in the same language. The man is awesome. But then who knows what anybody might know after traveling the universe for a thousand years...

** 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 particular -- andparticular—and, of course, extremely rare--strainrare—strain. It is implied that he never leaves the building during all of this, so Dexter's miraculous set of databases even cover what you might be doing with your genitals.

* 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 moments--andmoments—and even the reasons behind the places.