Science Mod Questions

[cyberKerb]

I had a few questions regarding a few varied things I'm looking at for a mod:

** Is it possible to reference a celestial bodies ground texture to utilise within a section of a part model?
Reasoning is I figure it might be better to use existing textures already in the game rather than import another texture file. It this just too hard to do and I shouldn't look at doing it and default to my own texture file?

** With the new-ish "Experiment Storage Units" being able to hoover up all completed experiments into it's own experiment container through the "Container: Collect All" button, is there anyway to have an experiment be excluded from this process and not be able to be sent to an "Experiment Storage Unit"? Or am I completely locked into this process as stock experiments only function this way with no available exclusions? Alternatively, is there a way to hide an experiment result (without destroying its information) from this process so the "collect all" function skips over it?

** What's easier to handle at the moment when you are coding a mod (as far as flexibility to get it to do what is desired - moving and handling a resource (eg dirt, water, etc...) or moving science experiments around? I ask as I'm thinking I might change the experiment idea I'm thinking of to a resource and just have contextual information (eg buttons to move stuff around, drop, pickup, etc..) until I'm ready to convert it to an actual science experiment result.

** Last one about models and animations: Cargo bays have an animation that is tied to the angle setting in the right click menu. Would it be possible to tie a flat plane in the model that represents the surface of water in a cylinder to the resource percentage amount of the part? eg  a Part holds 5000 unit of water at max, current has 2500 so the flat plane that is the water "surface" would read that as 50% and be shown at halfway point up the cylinder?

Edited August 15, 2017 by wile1411

[steedcrugeon]

1 hour ago, wile1411 said:

** Is it possible to reference a celestial bodies ground texture to utilise within a section of a part model?
Reasoning is I figure it might be better to use existing textures already in the game rather than import another texture file. It this just too hard to do and I shouldn't look at doing it and default to my own texture file?

The person to ask her would be @Angel-125 he may have a more precise answer as to whether that's viable. As for myself I will be using a set of textures to represent each celestial body, not ideal but easier for me (non-coder type person) to work with.

2 hours ago, wile1411 said:

** With the new-ish "Experiment Storage Units" being able to hoover up all completed experiments into it's own experiment container through the "Container: Collect All" button, is there anyway to have an experiment be excluded from this process and not be able to be sent to an "Experiment Storage Unit"? Or am I completely locked into this process as stock experiments only function this way with no available exclusions? Alternatively, is there a way to hide an experiment result (without destroying its information) from this process so the "collect all" function skips over it?

As far as I can see, anything which identifies as ModuleScienceExperiment will get 'hovered up'. There is not easy way to discriminate a chosen experiment (hard way is you write your own PartModule to handle the 'excluded' experiments issue and MM patch it over the science containers)..

2 hours ago, wile1411 said:

** What's easier to handle at the moment when you are coding a mod (as far as flexibility to get it to do what is desired - moving and handling a resource (eg dirt, water, etc...) or moving science experiments around? I ask as I'm thinking I might change the experiment idea I'm thinking of to a resource and just have contextual information (eg buttons to move stuff around, drop, pickup, etc..) until I'm ready to convert it to an actual science experiment result.

Think of this as well as it may sway your opinion, Kerbals can handle Science Experiments without any additional items/work. if you make it a resource then you'll need a Container for a Kerbal to handle it AND reliance on KIS.

2 hours ago, wile1411 said:

** Last one about models and animations: Cargo bays have an animation that is tied to the angle setting in the right click menu. Would it be possible to tie a flat plane in the model that represents the surface of water in a cylinder to the resource percentage amount of the part? eg  a Part holds 5000 unit of water at max, current has 2500 so the flat plane that is the water "surface" would read that as 50% and be shown at halfway point up the cylinder?

I've looked at this before, when I previously knew nothing about how animations are driven in KSP, it's not impossible but it will definitely be done using a custom plugin. There is no means in stock to get the 'deploy limiter' found on some cargo doors to driven by an Vessel/Part resource value, much less directly from and external influence. However, knowing what I know now and having seen the inner workings of the code @linuxgurugamer used to drive the rotating components of the FTLDriveContinued I can see how you might have a fluid level animation determined by resource amount. The biggest issues with this (and most immersion breaking) is that the fluid level would be fixed by the orientation that was set in the VAB/SPH editor. That is to say that for a fluid animation 'down' would always be whatever you built it to be, it would be entirely unaffected by gravity or indeed no gravity!

[cyberKerb]

4 hours ago, steedcrugeon said:

The person to ask her would be @Angel-125 he may have a more precise answer as to whether that's viable. As for myself I will be using a set of textures to represent each celestial body, not ideal but easier for me (non-coder type person) to work with.

As far as I can see, anything which identifies as ModuleScienceExperiment will get 'hovered up'. There is not easy way to discriminate a chosen experiment (hard way is you write your own PartModule to handle the 'excluded' experiments issue and MM patch it over the science containers)..

Thanks for these SD - this is great information and feedback.

Ever since the 1.2 got released, I've been trying to think of a around the ModuleScienceExperiment hoover option. I really didn't want to rewrite all those modules to collect all, take experiments, and store experiements just to exclude my one type of experiment. Everything tells me it's the wrong way to go. So I'm leaning heavily to change the mod idea to be resource based.
 

4 hours ago, steedcrugeon said:

Think of this as well as it may sway your opinion, Kerbals can handle Science Experiments without any additional items/work. if you make it a resource then you'll need a Container for a Kerbal to handle it AND reliance on KIS.

As it's just a resource (a number that adds weight to part right ), I think I can get around this without having to use KIS. I was going to give the EVAKerbal "part" a hidden resource figure so the resource bar  wouldn't show up in the right click menu. (They've got pockets, right? ) The mod would still need additional containers that would accept the new resource for transporting the stuff as the kerbals empty their pocket upon boarding. But I figure those container parts are as easy as a MM patch at a minimum, but I'll want to make some of my own containers for the mod to be distinctively different so it stands on it's own well. (Hence the water level plane idea) I think I remember someone doing hidden resources, so my gut says I might be fine once I dig into what people have already done out there.

4 hours ago, steedcrugeon said:

I've looked at this before, when I previously knew nothing about how animations are driven in KSP, it's not impossible but it will definitely be done using a custom plugin. There is no means in stock to get the 'deploy limiter' found on some cargo doors to driven by an Vessel/Part resource value, much less directly from and external influence. However, knowing what I know now and having seen the inner workings of the code @linuxgurugamer used to drive the rotating components of the FTLDriveContinued I can see how you might have a fluid level animation determined by resource amount. The biggest issues with this (and most immersion breaking) is that the fluid level would be fixed by the orientation that was set in the VAB/SPH editor. That is to say that for a fluid animation 'down' would always be whatever you built it to be, it would be entirely unaffected by gravity or indeed no gravity!

I anticipate having to write a plugin anyway, so I might as well learn a few things while I'm at it. Thanks for the point to FTLDriveContinued  - I'll add that to my list of things to research.  

Lastly - good point about the immersion breaking thing, just a note that I was mainly using water as the example to help convey the idea I had with the level moving. It would be more like a group of rocks (textured as the planet surface you got them from) with a cargo net lashing them to the bottom of the container, so I figure the immersion would still be intact with that. I'm really trying to come up with a part that gives contextual information about it's own status by it's looks alone. However, the user would still be able to check it's right click menu for specifics.

Cheers

Edited August 15, 2017 by wile1411