The aim is to put new light on the single ladder problem (SLP). Some new methods for finding complete integer solutions to the corresponding quartic equation z 4 −2L z 3 +( L 2 − a 2 − b 2 ) z 2 +2L a 2 z− L 2 a 2 =0 z4−2Lz3+(L2−a2−b2)z2+2La2z−L2a2=0 are developed. For the case L≥ L min L≥Lmin , these methods imply a complete parametric representation for integer ...