The thargoid link message is a puzzle that provides us with the distances of an unknown system
					relative
					to three known systems. By a process of triangulation we are able to identify a pair of 3D
					coordinates
					one of which is the location of the unknown system.
				

				

					However the link messages are calculated with a precision of three decimal places which means that
					the
					distances are not accurate enough to give us the precise location so we must search through a list
					of
					known stars to identify stars that are close to the calculated coordinates. Each candidate system
					has a
					error value measured in light years.
				

				

					Once we have a list of candidate systems, we can run the calculation is reverse to give us the
					distances
					using the same precision used by the Thargoids to calculate their message. If we have identified the
					correct system then the recalculated distances will match the distances given in the message. We use
					the
					recalulated distances to generate a pair of coordinates and then compare these to the original
					decoded
					coordinates to give us a control value measured in ly. An exact match on the system would have a
					control
					value of exctly 0ly.
				

				

					We also check to see if any of the recalculated distances match the original distances and this
					gives us
					a match value between 1 and 3. If we get a control value or zero and match value of 3 then we can be
					certain that we have the correct coordinates.