Are mod/bug bounties allowed? (orbital decay)

[Errol]

Not sure if this is allowed. I did check the forum rules, and it doesn't seem to have a specific rule. If not, I apologize, and don't mind a moderator deleting the thread.

Basically I want to offer money to revive a mod. The mod would be orbital decay, but I'm not interested in the main orbital decay mod that LGG had revived:
 

What I want to see revived is a stand alone version of the simplified orbital decay function that @severedsolo had started working on in his Kessler Syndrome mod, last updated in this version:

https://github.com/severedsolo/KesslerSyndrome/releases/tag/1.3

It apparently stopped working around stock 1.7 or 1.8...

I could look into creating a listing on a bug bounty site or something, not sure if this would be the correct thing to list on those sites though. Other than patreon or something, not sure what the best way would be to put up a bounty; open to suggestions.

Edited May 21, 2021 by Errol

[linuxgurugamer]

Have you tried contacting @severedsolo?

[Errol]

3 hours ago, linuxgurugamer said:

Have you tried contacting @severedsolo?

 

I was the guy asking him to work on the feature the most back when it was in kessler syndrome, I didn't want to keep pestering him about it if he isn't interested in it. But I mean, @severedsolo, if you are interested, I'd be willing to put a $150(cad) bounty on it.

 

Edited May 22, 2021 by Errol

[severedsolo]

2 hours ago, Errol said:

 

I was the guy asking him to work on the feature the most back when it was in kessler syndrome, I didn't want to keep pestering him about it if he isn't interested in it. But I mean, @severedsolo, if you are interested, I'd be willing to put a $150(cad) bounty on it.

 

I mean - firstly I'm fairly certain this would probably breach the forum rules on monetising mods. Secondly even if it didn't I wouldn't take it anyway, taking money creates certain, expectations on support etc. Things get messy when money is involved. (Just to be clear here, I'm not suggesting that it would go that way I'm just explaining why theoretically I would not accept money for a mod, in much the same way I would not support paid mods if Squad ever decided to go that route.)

Making a KSP mod isn't that hard, and I'd be willing to offer up my code in a way that's not tangled up in the rest of the Kessler Syndrome stuff if you wanted to fiddle with it and see if you could get it working, but that's as far as I'd be willing to go on it. I will say though, that it was always a hacky solution and a dedicated mod could do it much better.

Edited May 22, 2021 by severedsolo

[Errol]

1 minute ago, severedsolo said:

I mean - firstly I'm fairly certain this would probably breach the forum rules on monetising mods. Secondly even if it didn't I wouldn't take it anyway, taking money creates certain, expectations on support etc. Things get messy when money is involved. (Just to be clear here, I'm not suggesting that you are seriously talking about any of this I'm just explaining why theoretically I would not accept money for a mod.)

Making a KSP mod isn't that hard, and I'd be willing to offer up my code in a way that's not tangled up in the rest of the Kessler Syndrome stuff if you wanted to fiddle with it and see if you could get it working, but that's as far as I'd be willing to go on it. I will say though, that it was always a hacky solution and a dedicated mod could do it much better.

I can fully understand that, I figured it may be a faux pas on the forums, and respect your stance. I am very interested in fiddling with it myself, though I don't know anything about c# (or any programing language really....I learned a tiny bit of java in highschool about 15 years ago and now I'm intimidated even by mm configs). I do have some programmer friends who do know c# though, they can probably help.

[severedsolo]

9 minutes ago, Errol said:

I am very interested in fiddling with it myself

I will send you the files  by PM - it won't be today, but hopefully tomorrow. If I haven't done it by Wednesday hassle me by PM about it (because I know what I'm like and have a terrible memory)

[severedsolo]

@Errol As it turns out it wasn't so difficult to extract the Decay Manager stuff, as I had the foresight to make it into it's own script and not run from the main KesslerSyndrome script.

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/severedsolo/KesslerSyndrome/f8bf5a583bf653557da75c16ae66c041617adde0/KesslerSyndrome/DecayManager.cs

It should basically compile as is, once the references have been setup (plenty of people who can help you with that around here). You'll need to modify any lines that reference

HighLogic.CurrentGame.Parameters.CustomParams<KesslerSettings>()

as that is referencing Kessler Syndromes settings class, which your mod won't have.

Code is uncommented, sorry about that.

Also forum rules etc: I'm putting this into the public domain, anyone can do as they wish with it.

Edited May 22, 2021 by severedsolo

[Errol]

@severedsolo

 

Dood! So I just installed kessler syndrome 1.3 in ksp 1.11.2 and tested it, and it appears to work on debris. The setting for making it apply to all vessels doesn't seem to work, but hot dang....seems like if it looked broken it must have been a mod conflict!

EDIT: correction, it does apply to none debris vessels, it just seems that it does not work on the currently selected vessel.

Edited May 22, 2021 by Errol

[severedsolo]

12 minutes ago, Errol said:

Dood! So I just installed kessler syndrome 1.3 in ksp 1.11.2 and tested it, and it appears to work on debris. The setting for making it apply to all vessels doesn't seem to work, but hot dang....seems like if it looked broken it must have been a mod conflict!

 1.3 was the last version compiled in .Net 3.5 - it broke when the mod was recompiled in .Net 4.x.

In practical terms, that means "in it's current state it will only ever work if I compile it against an old version of the game" which I'm sure you can appreciate is not an option. It's probably fixable, I just didn't have the time or inclination to dig into it at the time.

[Errol]

12 minutes ago, severedsolo said:

 which I'm sure you can appreciate is not an option.

I'm sorry, but I don't understand. If this is a working solution, why is it not good enough? I'm not trying to be a jackass, I'm just naive, and don't really understand what net 3.5 is or is used for.

[severedsolo]

32 minutes ago, Errol said:

I'm sorry, but I don't understand. If this is a working solution, why is it not good enough? I'm not trying to be a jackass, I'm just naive, and don't really understand what net 3.5 is or is used for.

To grossly oversimplify: the framework or "language" that mods speak changed between KSP 1.7 and 1.8.

This means that as the code is right now, I'd have to continue to build Kessler syndrome against KSP 1.7 forever, because I literally can't build against the latest version of the game and continue to use .Net 3.5. It won't compile because it's speaking the wrong "language".

This means that I can't update to use newer features, if something changed between 1.7 and now, well tough luck. In effect I'm forced to choose between keeping Kessler Syndrome updated or keeping Decay Manager.

Now there is a third choice to be fair, which is that I figure out what changed and fix it properly. Obviously I did not take that choice at the time because as I said in the thread it never really seemed like a feature that belongs in Kessler Syndrome anyway and deserved it's own mod with a less hacky solution.

Edited May 22, 2021 by severedsolo

[linuxgurugamer]

56 minutes ago, severedsolo said:

 1.3 was the last version compiled in .Net 3.5 - it broke when the mod was recompiled in .Net 4.x.

In practical terms, that means "in it's current state it will only ever work if I compile it against an old version of the game" which I'm sure you can appreciate is not an option. It's probably fixable, I just didn't have the time or inclination to dig into it at the time.

Just curious, what broke?  I know I had to make some changes when upgrading from 3.5 to 4.x.

[Errol]

@linuxgurugamer

So far it seems to be working in my 1.11.2 save with ~200 mods (debris and other vessels). It does not seem to apply to the currently focused vessel and it also doesn't seem to work in the tracking station. Those are the only bugs(?) I can find (not sure if they were ever implemented).

I'm def going to be keeping this in my install to see how it goes, but I would like to be able to have it listed for the community to access somewhere (either spacedock or ckan or w/e) as a stand alone mod so anyone can access it.

@severedsolo I think I understand what you are saying. I'm reading it as meaning that I would need to compile the orbital decay manager with the settings refs removed against ksp 1.7 and net 3.5 in order to get a working standalone .dll that can be shared with the community, correct?

Edited May 22, 2021 by Errol

[severedsolo]

9 minutes ago, linuxgurugamer said:

Just curious, what broke?  I know I had to make some changes when upgrading from 3.5 to 4.x.

From memory, the hacky method of changing the orbit, which was changing the vessels SMA by assigning to it stopped working, and it wouldn't play catchup (same base cause probably). I'll admit I didn't do a deep dive, as I'd just come out of the other end of fixing Earn Your Stripes which also broke quite badly with the 4.x update. It's entirely possible that was a KSP bug which they fixed between 1.8 and 1.11, but *shrug*

6 minutes ago, Errol said:

@severedsolo I think I understand what you are saying. I'm reading it as meaning that I would need to compile the orbital decay manager with the settings refs removed against ksp 1.7 and net 3.5 in order to get a working standalone .dll that can be shared with the community, correct?

Pretty much. You could try compiling against 4.x and a later version, in case it was a KSP bug that has since been fixed, but if that didn't work, yeah you'd need to compile against 1.7

Edited May 22, 2021 by severedsolo

[Errol]

@severedsolo Do you think the bug could have had to do with the orbital drift compensation thingie?

[Stone Blue]

IIRC, they changed the KSP API, as well as splitting up some of the core Unity/KSP dlls when the last Unity update happened, which IIRC, happened to be 1.8.0... so theres, *that* also... Possibly NOT just a simple matter of removing/updating the references and recompiling against Net 4.5+ (tho hopefully that will work...)
Just to future proof, say for the next Unity update, when Unity *remote possibility* of dropping 4.5 support and do something assinine like go to 4.6, or 4.7 or even 4.8+ only vOv
IIRC, 4.8 will be the last version of true .Net. They've combined and rearranged a bunch of stuff to be released as some "new" thing called Net 5... vOv
Current Unity supports Net 4.5 to 4.8... no difference, other than mebbe future proofing... vOv

Edited May 23, 2021 by Stone Blue