Extremely trivial Star Wars question

Cafe Society
1

I came across this image, presumably of Luke’s targeting computer in A New Hope. (I’m not sure of its provenance; if it’s not an actual screen shot from the film, the point is probably moot.)

My question concerns the numbers on the bottom. The first and fifth digits both resemble a zero in Earth numerals, but - they are different from each other. Do they represent different values in the Star Wars universe? Is the placement significant (maybe an initial placeholder is different from one within a series)? Or perhaps the first character is not numeric at all, but an indicator of some unit of distance?

I told you this was extremely trivial, but given the sheer amount of *Star Wars *minutiae out there, I won’t be surprised if somebody here can answer this.

2

WAG: the first digit is actually a letter “O” (Why? No idea), the second is a zero.

3

Except the “O” has gaps on opposite sides.

The problem is that none of us are fluent in over 6 million forms of communications.

4

Well, you’ve got to remember they’re not speaking/reading english…they’re using “basic”

5

Well, why does the “8” look so stupid?

Screw it, I’m going down to Tosche Station.

6

Clearly the display is a parsec counter.

7

The Rebels are on a shoe-string budget. As such, they repair their ships with whatever materials are available. This craft had a burned-out leading digit on the display, and was repaired with salvaged parts from a somewhat older model, which had a different electronics supplier. Fortunately, the parts were mechanically compatible with only minor visual differences.

8

Is this where the Uranus/Klingon joke goes?

9

WAGS: The first one is a dummy light to let you know the display is working. Not all the numbers are always lit, and if they are all out, you know the display is still working because the first one is still on. If the first one is out, then something is wrong with the display.

Also, we have no idea what the numbers stand for. I once had an interesting experience listening to two non-drivers speculate on what “PRND12” on the dashboard of a car meant.

For that matter, the line through the second O may indicate that this is whatever “gear” or what have you the target is in right now, and the weird 8 could be “change direction,” or even another dummy light-- an hour glass, say-- that means the laser is recharging.

3 2 & 6 could be power levels, with 3 being “normal,” 2 being “small jolt,” in case you ever need that, and 6 being the highest, a combination of the two-- 2 x 3 = 6.

10

The whole display says, “Check Engine” in Jawa.

11

It was an odd decision for Production Design to, in the Star Wars universe, replace english letters with what has subsequently become known as Aurebesh (though it is a character-by-character substitution), but then decided to keep digits the same.

Though famously they forgot to do it in this shot, which has since been fixed.

I particularly like this giant “94”.

12

It’s not an actual screen shot. It seems to be a shirt design. Based on what shows up when you google images of star wars targeting computer I’m willing to bet that:

[ul]
[li]The first 0 is an actual zero.[/li][li]The second zero is a zero and one at the same time. The shirt designer was a moron who couldn’t tell when the still images he used as a template showed a double image of a rapidly changing old fashioned display.[/li][li]The last eight is an attempt to balance out there only being one other weird digit. All of the real screen shots show ordinary digits.[/li][/ul]

13

I just checked the movie. You’re totally right, that’s exactly what happened. Those numbers don’t even occur in the movie, Red Leader starts closer, and Luke’s shots skip over those numbers off-camera.

14

You can waste time with your friends when your chores are done.

15

So why aren’t X-Wings called Aurek-Wings, Y-Wings called Vev-Wings, and A-Wings called Osk-Wings? That’s what I’d like to know about it.

16

Your problem, Happy, is that you confuse people with the facts, that’s your problem.

17

I’d sooner kiss a wookie than fly a Vev-wing!

18

If they did that, they’d have to change the names of numbers and that’d mess up the prisoner transfer from cell block 1138 reference.

19

Not to mention, our fave droids would be named Resh-2-Dorn-2 and Cresh-3-Peth-Osk. Don’t exactly roll off the tongue, do they? :dubious:

20

Largely because Aurebesh wasn’t formalized by Lucasfilm during the original trilogy.

The Aurebesh characters which were used in the original trilogy (I think only in RotJ) were random. The first formal establishment of what is now known as the Aurebesh alphabet (with names for each character, and their English equivalents) was done by West End Games in a supplement for their Star Wars Roleplaying Game in 1994. In that era, there was very little in the way of formal canon in the Star Wars universe, and a lot of things which West End made up from whole cloth for the RPG were adopted by Lucasfilm as canon.

In the `97 Special Edition of A New Hope, one of the tweaks Lucas made was to change the English lettering of the tractor beam controls (which Obi-Wan deactivates) to Aurebesh.