Sky_walker

Definitely. It should be a no.1 priority after 0.24. It'd make some people happy, but IMHO: They'd have to re-think it completely. TBH: I wouldn't mind if they'd scrap space planes all together. I'd much more gladly see this: then messing with space plane parts when they clearly have no clear vision of what role space planes should fill in the game to make them something more than just a toys they are now.

Certainly. Though in the end if everything will rely on commercial components - from spacecrafts (mentioned by you), through launch systems (Falcon) down to components (Bigelow) - then is it really a successor to ISS or rather: First ever commercial space station? US - as a government - isn't on a good way to regain a capacity of sending man into space. Orion test flight is to be launched in December, but the first manned flight is planned for 2020 - that's 6 years gap. 6 years during which new president / management might change plans just as it happened many times before with other NASA manned space programs. SLS has met a lot of criticism and push from many people to replace it completely with private systems. And as far as I know - NASA didn't even begun to plan any replacement for ISS. To compare: Chinese are at a stage of realizing very concrete roadmap for their Tiangong Space Station. Russians already have started sending a components for their OPSEK Space Station that will replace ISS for them.

1. There are many ideas, none of them practical or tested. ISS already has got maximized lifetime of it's outer hull, at least: as much as it is financially feasible (eg. modules pointing "forward" got better protection than these in a "rear"). 2. ISS SAW are already replacable 3. Again: the same problem as with the airplane. There's only as much as you can put inside accessible to the crew, and there's always a price attached to that (eg. a risk of fire or accidentally breaking something) 4. ISS modules already can be detached from the station (and by this: replaced with a new one, though obviously replacing some would be very complex as they have more than one other component attached to them) 5. Higher altitude is better in a sense that it means less atmospheric drag, but also: more expensive launches and heavier protection from a radiation. Food in theory could be produced on the station - but this requires launching of large and heavy modules that consume power and add to the volume (=risk), and they still need to be resupplied (plants can't live on a light alone). NASA is a major investor in ISS. And NASA got a huge problem: Presidents that change goals and ideas as soon as they get in the office. So.... let's put it this way: I have my doubts if ISS will have any direct replacement. At least: not until US will regain a capacity of sending man into space on it's own.

It's much more complicated than that. High precision optical elements like mirrors or lenses need to have a homogeneous structure made of very precisely selected material - manufacturing glass or metal alone is a very difficult process with only a handful facilities around the world capable of producing highest quality base - in nearly all cases these are completely separate companies from those that do the next step. It has to have a composition adjusted down to fractions of percentage and a homogeneous structure, which means that they have to be slowly cooled with equal rate in it's whole volume which is a very time-taking process that needs to take place in a very controlled environment. Then these slabs of glass or metal are transported to the final manufacturer who cuts them and molds to a rough shape of a final product - than it is polished while rotating on their axis (to ensure desired spherical surface) using various materials stepping down to finer and finer grades. It's a very complex and precise process that even for commercially available lenses can take hours (in some cases days) using extremely precise equipment under controlled environment. We're talking here about removing layers of atoms in a final polish. That's why DSLR lenses can cost thousands of dollars each. It's a very complex process requiring a lot of super-precise manufacturing techniques. Nothing that comes even remotely close within a reach of 3D printing even solely by the requirement of having a homogeneous crystalline structure.

Source. Read more about IXV.

Yep, I'd love to see that in KSP. It's like saying that if KSP supports mods: devs don't have to add any content to the game at all. Performance impact from playing the music is impossible to measure. It's one of the cheapest and easiest things for a computer to do.

Based on what we learnt from over a 100 years spent building airplanes - how do we build an airplane, that can fly perhaps 50-100 years, or even permanently? It's the same sort of question. Nothing is permanent. Not even earth crust.

Problem is that they have extremely limited options with satellite that doesn't have an operational thrusters. If anything - they could just collect data they is being beaconed... and that's pretty much all. ISEE is a very primitive satellite by modern standard, so there isn't much they can do with it. Besides - I already posted their statement on a case, it's on a previous page, but let me post it again:

Clueless post is clueless.

Nope, it doesn't. It looks horrendous. Not to mention that it looks like something taken out of a mod - doesn't fit the game ascetics at all. THIS.

We never needed it.

Usually satellites rotate around one of its axes at a rate which matches the orbital period. Yes, it requires high degree of precision and occasional corrections, however it's nothing like in Kerbal where you're forced to re-orient your satellites manually every few moments. Doing something like that would require huge amount of fuel (over a period of many orbits) and by this: significantly shorten a life time the satellite. Gravity gradient is not feasible for vast majority of satellites and it can create additional dangers in a form of debris that are borderline impossible to detect.

For it to make any sense - it'd have to ban editing of any files in the game directory too. What's the point of banning debug console if you still can edit in engines that don't use any fuel, or other equally stupid things / mods? From all possible reasons why I might want to see something like you propose in a game - that's the last one. TBH: I'd rather vote for keeping the debug bar if it means KSP will never get Achievements.

I build a simpler one - Just used Small Gear Bays to lower my crane on a cargo instead of some large rocket mounted on indestructible flexible docking ports... his way feels way too much like exploiting a broken game mechanic (docks should fall apart when too much force is applied, they shouldn't turn into a rubber). Yea, sure, my method requires much more precision and cargo always needs to have a docking port in the same height - never the less: it works fine

Look up last 4 dev blog entries. It's all there. Yes, I pointed that out in my own post. To quote the man himself: or It's all there. So this: is a baseless hope.

Delta-V for each stage would need to be shown in the editor too. Obviously. This would give some good hint for a beginning. It's better to know that you're going to run out of fuel while playing with maneuver nodes than in a middle of a burn. That's a thing that makes new players frustrated. Tons of planning and effort just to end up with dry ship in a middle of nowhere. When you know something goes wrong while toying with nodes - at least you got a chance to do something useful with remaining fuel. IMHO game shouldn't force you to use mods in order to obtain one of the most essential informations.

Assuming they would like to wipe us out completely and don't care about re-using the planet later on.... or that they're rad-proof themselves... or that nuking is necessary for them to begin terraforming... *eyerolls*

Damn :/ Still a nice try though.

Really? His vest is in a museum? loooooool

We don't know if 0.24 will bring any parts for space planes. Intern was working on fixes and changes to the existing parts and just started planning on a new stuff. Don't expect anything, cause expectations lead to disappointment.

Wikipedia is wrong again >_> Remind me to double-check next time

It's "Space Shuttle Orbiter Vehicle". "Orbiter Vehicle" is just a short cut, more common one being "Space Shuttle orbiter" (without "Vehicle" part). Technically they are also an orbiters. Orbiter == spacecraft that orbits. Yes, it is. In October.

It did after all! Impressive. Russians seem to be in an imperialistic mood recently. Hopefully one good thing will come out of it - even more push for Angara and investments in space.

What we care about is a binary operation: Either they're danger to our civilization or not. If they are - Active SETI is a horrible idea. If they are not - it's a brilliant idea. Any civilization capable of space flight would need to have an in-depth knowledge of mathematics, and that's enough to judge behaviour of another civilization when encounter would happen. Mathematical projection look very bad for humans: What you call "anthropomorphising" is simply an attempt of applying universal science to the prediction of future for another civilization. Something that they'd very likely do at least at the very beginning. Civilizations like that are beyond scope of this discussion. They in vast majority won't be inclined to leave their planet. Unless they happen to have animals capable of FTL travel - they'd require tons of "hard" science in order to reach Earth - science that's easiest to learn by expansionary species. Any civilisation advanced enough to achieve space flight would have capacity to calculate (at least very approximate) probability of life in the galaxy, and by that: they'd at least look for a signal. Separate matter is if they'd look for what we're sending - they equally well might come up with a conclusion that lasers would be most efficient way, so instead of looking for radio frequencies - they'd look for light, something in style of irregular flashing, even more so as this can also lead to discoveries of planets circling around the stars. Problem with that is quite obvious: You seem to assume aliens would seek out to kill every single human out there. What for? It's enough they'd kill over 75%. And that can be achieved by surprise orbital attack aiming at sources of light visible from the orbit. After that we are not a threat in a long term any more for a civilization with technical capability of crossing distances between stars in a reasonable amount of time. We with our nukes and missiles wouldn't be much more of a danger for them than tigers or lions are for us.