What was Data doing before the D?

So we know Data had a pretty lengthy career in Starfleet before arriving on the Enterprise-D. We saw that during his tenure on the D/E, he came pretty far in his goal of mastering human behavior. Are we to believe that this goal started when he showed up at the start of TNG? That he made slow progress ever since he was discovered?

 

he spent a gap-decade in space thailand

 

He may had an assignment where there was little social interaction. Remma the episode where Geordi fell for that woman who lived aboard some kind of relay station with only one other person. Perhaps Data had an assignment like that for some time.

He also may have been assigned to an area of a ship, outpost, starbase, facility where he didn't get to socialize much.

But again, he must have done something to catch Picard's eye.

 

I think that on Data's previous assignments (which included a tour of duty aboard the Starship Trieste), Data was very much cold and robotic in demeanor and it took years for him to become as personable as he was by the time of "Encounter At Farpoint."

 

He'd been activated about 26 years before "Datalore", so he might have been trying to emulate humans as early as then. The D crew simply encouraged him in those efforts; perhaps people from his earlier assignments didn't try to help him with it that much.

 

That might have made an interesting episode, via some kind of flashback-type thing, from some event early in Data's career. It would be interesting to see him behaving in a way like you say.

 

Most of his early career was telling various starship captains that, when the ship was attacked, it had suffered "major hull damage."

 

He was a counselor.

It didn't work out.

 

I could see some bureaucrat deciding he was perfect for one of those comm relays manned by two or three people like in Aquiel and being stuck there for years because he's not vocal enough to complain about it.

 

I'm surprised Starfleet didn't install him on one of those automated ore freighters we were always hearing about.

 

Pleasurebot on Risa.

 

Maybe it wasn't so much Data being physically isolated, but emotionally isolated, either by his own behavior or by others' towards him. Perhaps in his 26 yrs prior, he was constantly surrounded by people that treated him merely as a device, and not as an individual; instead of taking an interest in him like the E-D bridge crew, they may have simply ignored him.

 

Didn't Data chronicle the course of his previous Starfleet career in Deja Q?

 

Can you make Lt. Commander without interacting and working with the crew?

 

No. He was talking about how long it takes a starfleet officer to retain certain ranks. Absolutely nothing about his experiences before the D

 

I hear he is fully functional...

 

I highly doubt it, but interacting with his coworkers & socializing on the level he did aboard the D might have been two very different things for him. Following orders efficiently, & distinguishing himself in his post might have gone a long way to move him up the ranks if he had the right commanding officers, at least a couple times anyway to get him past Lt. Junior Grade & Lieutenant

I don't think anything was ever mentioned about Data's rank just prior to being posted to the Enterprise. It's possible he was promoted to Lt. Cmdr when he was assigned to the D, & that the biggest jump in his entire career was wholly due to Picard, who fostered almost every officer under him on that ship, & took big leaps of faith with them as well

Let us also not forget the occasions where he earned those 4 medals we hear mentioned in The Measure of a Man, all of which recognize gallantry, bravery, & excellence in action. We ourselves have seen multiple occasions where just having Data onboard has saved the ship & crew from being lost. Perhaps there were a couple of those kinds of situations in his earlier career as well, which not only wound up getting him medals, but also promotions, perhaps even catching Picard's eye & lining him up for the 3rd seat on the D

I sort of view it like this myself too. The D crew were maybe the first people to treat him not only like an actual person, but a friend. It was his friendship with them that really expanded his social growth. The crew were always very open to him as a person, where that might not have been the case for him in years prior

 

You spelled "Tasha" wrong.

 

Backed up by the costuming mistake in the past scenes of All Good Things, where he is still a Lieutenant. (ie. Picard forgot to promote him this time).