The Valtane Enigma

[The Wormhole]

Well, given that it's basically a text file, and also given that the size of a starship's databanks are practically infinite, why not?

Even if it is a simple text file in a database of near infinite capacity, why would anyone think a log entry on stardate 9521 about the Excelsior undergoing minor repairs is significant enough to remember? Does Starfleet actually load up the databases on each ship with every trivial log entry?

Must have sucked for the Equinox, I imagine due to damage they were cut off from their database. They wouldn't be able to read about that time Captain Harriman ordered a fresh coat of paint on the doors to crew quarters on deck 6 on the Enterprise B. No wonder they felt they had to slaughter those aliens.

Well, as I said, it wouldn't take up much room in the computers. And given that the smallest detail could become important, isn't it a good idea to have it? It's not like they are having to pick and choose due to limited space. And besides, the situations that other starships have found themselves in relates directly to the mission of any other starship, after all.

It is rather silly that every little detail about starship life is being preserved for future generations to read. And I'd be making this complaint even if it were a ship in the Alpha Quadrant checking up this detail on Memory Alpha over the space internet. Really, how far do we take this? Did Ben Maxwell read over the maintenance floor logs of the Kelvin's janitor detailing what times each day he mopped the decks, scrubbed the toilets and washed the windows to gain the inspiration he needed to attack the Cardassians? Did Riker review the shipping invoices of every food, drink, spice, ingredient NX-01's chef brought aboard while trying to decide what to do about Admiral Pressman? Do Starfleet cadets have to review the files related to Robert April's soap shortage and determine how they would deal with this, both from the perspective of being the captain and being one of the crew?

 

[Tiberius]

Even if it is a simple text file in a database of near infinite capacity, why would anyone think a log entry on stardate 9521 about the Excelsior undergoing minor repairs is significant enough to remember? Does Starfleet actually load up the databases on each ship with every trivial log entry?

Must have sucked for the Equinox, I imagine due to damage they were cut off from their database. They wouldn't be able to read about that time Captain Harriman ordered a fresh coat of paint on the doors to crew quarters on deck 6 on the Enterprise B. No wonder they felt they had to slaughter those aliens.

Well, as I said, it wouldn't take up much room in the computers. And given that the smallest detail could become important, isn't it a good idea to have it? It's not like they are having to pick and choose due to limited space. And besides, the situations that other starships have found themselves in relates directly to the mission of any other starship, after all.

It is rather silly that every little detail about starship life is being preserved for future generations to read. And I'd be making this complaint even if it were a ship in the Alpha Quadrant checking up this detail on Memory Alpha over the space internet. Really, how far do we take this? Did Ben Maxwell read over the maintenance floor logs of the Kelvin's janitor detailing what times each day he mopped the decks, scrubbed the toilets and washed the windows to gain the inspiration he needed to attack the Cardassians? Did Riker review the shipping invoices of every food, drink, spice, ingredient NX-01's chef brought aboard while trying to decide what to do about Admiral Pressman? Do Starfleet cadets have to review the files related to Robert April's soap shortage and determine how they would deal with this, both from the perspective of being the captain and being one of the crew?

Woah, hold on there.

I'm saying that Ben Maxwell HAD ACCESS to the Kelvin's janitorial reports, not that he read each and every one of them. Riker HAD ACCESS to the manifest for NX-01, but that doesn't mean that he read them.

But it is conceivable that , say, a bridge crew complains of a particular illness at random intervals. Check back through the logs, and all of a sudden... "Captain! We've found that the Starship McGuffin had a similar illness, and they discovered that it happened every time Ensign Ricky had the night shift because he liked the 'new shuttlecraft' scented air freshener. That air freshener was made with Blekovian pine, and it's only after traditional Blekovian holidays that our crew suffers the same illness. Our Blekovian officer, Lieutenant Biagkjrguahreig is cooking a traditional Blekovian dinner for himself - using Blekovian pine - and the traces of the food on his uniform are being spread to the rest of the bridge crew and causing the illness!"

Given the sort of weird shit we've seen Starships deal with, this would be pretty tame by comparison! And yet it was only the records of the air freshener used on the night shift on some other ship who knows how long ago that allowed the connection to be made. I'm sure Starfleet has learnt that ANY detail can be important. And dumping the whole text file into a ship's computers is going to be much easier, faster and more productive in terms of manpower than sifting through each and every scrap of information, determining how likely it is to be helpful in some potentially unknown situation, and then keeping or discarding it based on that. And as I said, when you are dealing with tiny little plaintext files being put into almost bottomless computer banks, space is NOT an issue.

 

[The Wormhole]

Stuff like that loses relevance over time though. By the 2360s and 70s, no one would care at all that Crewman Foster cleaned the bridge viewscreen window of the Kelvin at 14:35 on stardate 2233.03. Or that Chef had an unusual amount cumin shipped aboard NX-01 before it was decommissioned. Or that Robert April's crew had to stop bathing for six weeks in early 2247. Or that Harriman thought crew quarters had a door with faded paint in 2298. Or that Excelsior needed minor repairs in 2293.

Damn it, an alarmingly large amount of people don't save their receipts, usually throwing them away almost immediately after they make a purchase if they even bother to take the receipt. Starfleet's not hold onto shipping manifests and maintenance reports a century after the fact.

 

[JarodRussell]

Flashback got a lot wrong in regards to TUC. In Flashback, Sulu takes the Excelsior into Klingon space to rescue Kirk and Bones a few days after the Praxis explosion. But in TUC, few months go by after the explosion before Gorkon and his staff arrive on the Enterprise for dinner. Honestly, Tuvok has a faulty memory is the best excuse for everything. Valtane, timing of the Praxis incident.

But the part that really bothers me is when Janeway looks up everything in Starfleet records, which includes the Excelsior's sensor logs on the nebula and a log entry from Sulu saying the ship is undergoing minor repairs. Why is this in the starship's database? Wouldn't it be more convenient for it to be in space Wikipedia, or Memory Alpha which starship crews can access via space internet? Sure, that would mean the Voyager crew wouldn't have access to this, but really does Starfleet actually load up each starship's database with every sensor readings the ship made and every mundane captain's log entry? Besides, how the hell does someone read a log entry from Sulu saying his ship is undergoing minor repairs and decide "starships 80 years in the future are going to need to know that."

Well, given that it's basically a text file, and also given that the size of a starship's databanks are practically infinite, why not?

This is one of the most unrealistic aspects regarding future computer use. Just look at today, and the turn to cloud based services. Starship computers would not contain anything other their own data. Anything else would be accessed "online".

 

[Nerys Myk]

Flashback got a lot wrong in regards to TUC. In Flashback, Sulu takes the Excelsior into Klingon space to rescue Kirk and Bones a few days after the Praxis explosion. But in TUC, few months go by after the explosion before Gorkon and his staff arrive on the Enterprise for dinner. Honestly, Tuvok has a faulty memory is the best excuse for everything. Valtane, timing of the Praxis incident.

But the part that really bothers me is when Janeway looks up everything in Starfleet records, which includes the Excelsior's sensor logs on the nebula and a log entry from Sulu saying the ship is undergoing minor repairs. Why is this in the starship's database? Wouldn't it be more convenient for it to be in space Wikipedia, or Memory Alpha which starship crews can access via space internet? Sure, that would mean the Voyager crew wouldn't have access to this, but really does Starfleet actually load up each starship's database with every sensor readings the ship made and every mundane captain's log entry? Besides, how the hell does someone read a log entry from Sulu saying his ship is undergoing minor repairs and decide "starships 80 years in the future are going to need to know that."

Well, given that it's basically a text file, and also given that the size of a starship's databanks are practically infinite, why not?

This is one of the most unrealistic aspects regarding future computer use. Just look at today, and the turn to cloud based services. Starship computers would not contain anything other their own data. Anything else would be accessed "online".

Not every Starship would be in an area where "service" is available.

 

[DS9forever]

I thought it was weird that Tuvok's memory included external shots of the Excelsior.

Even the VOY special effects crew made a mistake in "Flashback", the Excelsior's nacelles never glowed in the films and early TNG, but they did in "Flashback". Tuvok's wacky mind again.

 

[MacLeod]

Wasn't that the difference between the two 30th Anniversary episodes. The people behind DSN's "Trails and Tribble-ations" seemed to pay more attention to those small details. As if it a lot more care was paid by everyone involved in making it.

 

[R. Star]

Trials and Tribbleations was a fun adventure the whole crew was in on and got a part of that tied back to a classic.

Flashback.. was just Janeway and Tuvok with the others spitting out a bit of technobabble that isn't even consistent with itself. Great effort to get Takei and all the Excelsior extras. Poor execution.

 

[T'Girl]

In the TV episode, Valtane dies before the USS Excelsior gets to Khitomer, but as everyone knows, he appeared alive and well on the bridge of the Excelsior at the end of TUC, after the battle of Khitomer.

Flashback got a lot wrong in regards to TUC. In Flashback, Sulu takes the Excelsior into Klingon space to rescue Kirk and Bones a few days after the Praxis explosion. But in TUC, few months go by after the explosion before Gorkon and his staff arrive on the Enterprise for dinner.

Tuvok remembers the Praxis shock wave, and he remembers the battle around Khitomer, but owing to the illness he doesn't recall the months of relatively uneventful events in-between. The shock wave and the battle were dramatic events that left more of a imprint upon Tuvok's memories

Tuvok likely remembers Valtane's actual death aboard the Excelsior, it just got "moved" by his illness. there could be a lot of things in the episode that occurred years before or later that were juxtapositioned into that time period.

 

[Avro Arrow]

This is one of the most unrealistic aspects regarding future computer use. Just look at today, and the turn to cloud based services. Starship computers would not contain anything other their own data. Anything else would be accessed "online".

Not every Starship would be in an area where "service" is available.

Exactly... fly into the Bassen Rift, and suddenly you lose your "online" astrocartography feed.

This actually bugged me. Yeah, OK, if you want to look up maintenance logs from the Excelsior from 100 years ago, sure, contact Memory Alpha and access them "online". But your space maps? Yeah, those are kind of important, and you'd think Starfleet would be able to spare a kiloquad or two to store a copy of their astrocartography data locally on the ship's computer.

 

[The Wormhole]

Well, to be fair, Nemesis was the first and only reference to a space internet, thereby proving that not everything is kept in a starship database.

 

[Praetor]

Y'know, the concept of a Starfleet internet could provide for some fascinating connectivity between starships which we've never really seen overtly referred to before, but which would indeed why minute information seemed accessible on almost any ship. Of course, the whole real-time subspace connectivity thing seems like it would be prone with problems to me.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Not every Starship would be in an area where "service" is available.

I always assumed that computer access is always available, everywhere, in the Trek future. There literally is no area where service is unavailable. Their equivalent of the Internet would be truly universal.

I mean, with all that technology, really, how could this NOT be the case?

That being said: "The Valtane Enigma" would be a great name for a murder mystery. Somebody should get right on that.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Not every Starship would be in an area where "service" is available.

I always assumed that computer access is always available, everywhere, in the Trek future. There literally is no area where service is unavailable. Their equivalent of the Internet would be truly universal.

I mean, with all that technology, really, how could this NOT be the case?

That being said: "The Valtane Enigma" would be a great name for a murder mystery. Somebody should get right on that.

Ships on deep space missions of exploration far from Federation space.

 

[Tiberius]

Stuff like that loses relevance over time though. By the 2360s and 70s, no one would care at all that Crewman Foster cleaned the bridge viewscreen window of the Kelvin at 14:35 on stardate 2233.03. Or that Chef had an unusual amount cumin shipped aboard NX-01 before it was decommissioned. Or that Robert April's crew had to stop bathing for six weeks in early 2247. Or that Harriman thought crew quarters had a door with faded paint in 2298. Or that Excelsior needed minor repairs in 2293.

Or that a guy on a research station took a shower in his clothes in 2265...

Damn it, an alarmingly large amount of people don't save their receipts, usually throwing them away almost immediately after they make a purchase if they even bother to take the receipt. Starfleet's not hold onto shipping manifests and maintenance reports a century after the fact.

Why not? Like I've said, it's not going to take up much space, and they are very organized.

 

[Tiberius]

Flashback got a lot wrong in regards to TUC. In Flashback, Sulu takes the Excelsior into Klingon space to rescue Kirk and Bones a few days after the Praxis explosion. But in TUC, few months go by after the explosion before Gorkon and his staff arrive on the Enterprise for dinner. Honestly, Tuvok has a faulty memory is the best excuse for everything. Valtane, timing of the Praxis incident.

But the part that really bothers me is when Janeway looks up everything in Starfleet records, which includes the Excelsior's sensor logs on the nebula and a log entry from Sulu saying the ship is undergoing minor repairs. Why is this in the starship's database? Wouldn't it be more convenient for it to be in space Wikipedia, or Memory Alpha which starship crews can access via space internet? Sure, that would mean the Voyager crew wouldn't have access to this, but really does Starfleet actually load up each starship's database with every sensor readings the ship made and every mundane captain's log entry? Besides, how the hell does someone read a log entry from Sulu saying his ship is undergoing minor repairs and decide "starships 80 years in the future are going to need to know that."

Well, given that it's basically a text file, and also given that the size of a starship's databanks are practically infinite, why not?

This is one of the most unrealistic aspects regarding future computer use. Just look at today, and the turn to cloud based services. Starship computers would not contain anything other their own data. Anything else would be accessed "online".

Well, since Janeway was able to access Sulu's logs from the Delta Quadrant, and I doubt Voyager had a connection to Starfleet at the time, I don't think this is true.

 

[Hando]

^Well remember that Voyager was generally strange with databases. Just remember 11:59.

 

[Tiberius]

^Well remember that Voyager was generally strange with databases. Just remember 11:59.

Oh, I'd really prefer not to...

 

[F. King Daniel]

Wasn't that the difference between the two 30th Anniversary episodes. The people behind DSN's "Trails and Tribble-ations" seemed to pay more attention to those small details. As if it a lot more care was paid by everyone involved in making it.

Like Sisko's bright yellow command shirt

 

[USS Triumphant]

Valtane has a twin brother. In TUC when the Praxis wave hit Excelsior, one Valtane brother is seen next to Sulu's captain's chair and another Valtane brother is seen in a cutaway shot at the science station reacting to the shockwave. Check it out, it's really there!

I rewatched TUC last night, and can confirm this, because I looked for it when the time came. Sure, it probably was a production error, but it does provide a canonical hook to hang Opus's theory off of if one wanted to. I like it, anyway.