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{{trope}}
[[File:
{{quote|'''Horatio''': I need a report on ''all the walls ever made ever''.
'''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.
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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-Friendly Interface]]. If it's on paper or supernatural, it's a [[Great Big Book of Everything]].
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{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==
* Inspector Runge from ''[[Monster (manga)|Monster]]'' keeps an absurdly expansive encyclopedia on practically everything in his head by constantly making a typing motion and saying that he's just calling up the memories as he needs them, or something along those lines.
* The titular character of ''[[
* Somewhat justified in the ''[[Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex]]'' considering the heavily cyber-ized world, although it's averted in that it doesn't work all the time.
== Comic Books ==
* Almost every depiction of [[Batman]] has this, whether it's his own vast knowledge (a la [[Sherlock Holmes]]), the Batcave computer, or a combination of both. In one ''[[Justice League of America]]'' issue, it is shown that Batman's database of fingerprints looks at the magical databases of the Batcave, the GCPD, AFIS, JLA Headquarters and Superman's fortress of solitude. This allows him to determine the identity of a ''31st century superhero'' because Superman had been friends with him the past... err... future...
* ''[[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.
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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.
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** This trope was lampshaded with:
{{quote|"Can you believe someone put together a database of grille dimensions?"}}
**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]]'''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]]'''s main characters are a secret organization with nationwide database records sorted by an ancient alien computer system. The team is capable of literally [[
** ''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 ''[[Angel]]'', Wolfram & Hart has access to several databases which actually ''are'' magical. Before Angel's team got access to these they used "Demons, Demons, Demons: The Demon Database".
** 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 7
* ''[[Doctor Who]]'':
** 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.
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* 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 ''[[Red Dwarf]]'' 2009 revival parodies this. {{spoiler|1=After returning to Earth circa 2009, the guys from Red Dwarf find out that they are characters from a TV show by way of a video store showing the currently playing episode on their TVs. One salesman comments he never liked the show, and questions how a device Kryten is holding could know everything. Lister then asks the Kryten who the man is, which Kryten finds out from the device that he is "a pompous know-it-all, with a very small penis."}}
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* 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 ==
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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-Fire Typing]] with his [[Magical Computer]].
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[[Category:Information Desk]]
[[Category:Magical Database]]
[[Category:Technology Tropes]]
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