Kramer

Loving RP-1 with KSP 1.12.3. Works really well and great visuals with RTX 3070. One thing I cannot figure out -- how do I get solar panels that track the sun? I use parts that seem like they are supposed to track the sun like ROS-FoldingSolarPanel but they do not track the sun. What tech node do I need to get tracking solar panels? And what panels are supposed to track the sun? -Thanks

Yeah, I see a new rescue mission for KSP: rescue Elon's roadster from the orbit of Kerbol :*) It remains to be seen what orbit they actually do place it in. If the car has no cameras and antenna then a mars fly-by would not have much value other than for talking points.

I was intrigued with Elon Musk's tweet about launching his Tesla Roadster to the "orbit of mars". I had RSS setup in KSP and decided to simulate such a launch using Shadowmage's SSTU mod to make a Falcon Heavy and a demo payload. I proved to myself that such a mission was possible. I made a video of the result using camera tools: Falcon Heavy Demo Mission Simulation in KSP. Can't wait for the real life launch!

Well I figured this out, so to answer my own question... I think I read in another post that you cannot change the rotation lock my a large amount. Thinking about how it is used via the GUI this makes some sense. It normally keeps the __CURRENT__ orientation when you engage this mode. So I changed the code to gradually shift the rotation lock quaternion from the current position to the desired one. This worked very well. Here is code that I came up with that I put in my FixedUpdate() handler: bool sasWasOn = vessel.ActionGroups[KSPActionGroup.SAS]; vessel.ActionGroups.SetGroup(KSPActionGroup.SAS, true); vessel.ActionGroups.SetGroup(KSPActionGroup.RCS, true); if (vessel.Autopilot.Mode != VesselAutopilot.AutopilotMode.StabilityAssist || !vessel.Autopilot.Enabled || !sasWasOn) { vessel.Autopilot.Enable(VesselAutopilot.AutopilotMode.StabilityAssist); sas_orientation_set = false; } Quaternion quat = Quaternion.LookRotation(tgt_tr.up.normalized, -zaxis); Quaternion cquat = vessel.Autopilot.SAS.lockedRotation; float angle = Math.Abs(Quaternion.Angle(cquat, quat)); // really we just want to move like 0.1 degrees per update or something // so to do that we would have fractional amount f: f*angle = 0.1 or f = 0.1/angle if (angle > 0) { float f = 0.1f / angle; Quaternion getting_there = Quaternion.Slerp(cquat, quat, f); vessel.Autopilot.SAS.LockRotation(getting_there); sas_orientation_set = true; } else if (!sas_orientation_set) { vessel.Autopilot.SAS.LockRotation(quat); sas_orientation_set = true; } Hope this may help anyone trying to do the same thing.

I am working on a plugin for docking and am trying to align the current vessel with the docking axis of the target. I am trying to use the vessel Autopilot.SAS to do this and so far it does not seem to work. In my FixedUpdate() handler I am first ensuring that it is in StabilityAssist mode: if (vessel.Autopilot.Mode != VesselAutopilot.AutopilotMode.StabilityAssist) { Deb.Log("Engaging StabilityAssist"); vessel.Autopilot.SetMode(VesselAutopilot.AutopilotMode.StabilityAssist); sas_orientation_set = false; } And then calculating a quaternion based on the target zaxis (which is the target transform forward vector) and the target transform up vector: Quaternion quat = Quaternion.LookRotation(-zaxis, tgt_tr.up.normalized); And then setting that if I have not already set it: if (!sas_orientation_set) { Deb.Log("SAS set to quat: {0}", quat); vessel.Autopilot.SAS.LockRotation(quat); sas_orientation_set = true; } I also am printing out the current "lockedRotation" quant and what I set it to: Deb.Log("currentRotationLock: {0}", vessel.Autopilot.SAS.lockedRotation); Deb.Log("desiredRotationLock: {0}", quat); Initially the two values match up, but after a few updates, the lockedRotation value changes to what it was before I set it: [LOG 23:42:22.139] [KRAMAX] currentRotationLock: (0.0, -0.6, 0.0, -0.8) [LOG 23:42:22.139] [KRAMAX] desiredRotationLock: (-0.3, -0.3, 0.2, 0.9) [LOG 23:42:22.140] [KRAMAX] SAS set to quat: (-0.3, -0.3, 0.2, 0.9) [LOG 23:42:22.163] [KRAMAX] currentRotationLock: (-0.3, -0.3, 0.2, 0.9) [LOG 23:42:22.164] [KRAMAX] desiredRotationLock: (-0.3, -0.3, 0.2, 0.9) [LOG 23:42:22.164] [KRAMAX] SAS set to quat: (-0.3, -0.3, 0.2, 0.9) [LOG 23:42:22.187] [KRAMAX] currentRotationLock: (-0.3, -0.3, 0.2, 0.9) [LOG 23:42:22.187] [KRAMAX] desiredRotationLock: (-0.3, -0.3, 0.2, 0.9) [LOG 23:42:22.192] [KRAMAX] currentRotationLock: (0.0, -0.6, 0.0, -0.8) [LOG 23:42:22.193] [KRAMAX] desiredRotationLock: (-0.3, -0.3, 0.2, 0.9) [LOG 23:42:22.215] [KRAMAX] currentRotationLock: (0.0, -0.6, 0.0, -0.8) Does anyone know how to make this work? I would really like to use SAS to do this and not have to write my own yaw/pitch/roll autopilot or require users to use mechjeb. -Thanks, Kramer

The indentation is definitely off, but I checked and the brackets are correct. But good thought. Before I posted I did check the log files and I presume such an error would show up there. The plugins I found similar to what you posted are all out of date and do not work with the current RSS I think. But I downloaded one just to check it against what I was doing and found the problem--it was very simple. I just needed to change the starting line from: @Kopernicus:AFTER[Kopernicus] to @Kopernicus:AFTER[RealSolarSystem] So simple. And now I have my new dwarf planet. -Thanks

I have RSS v12.0 installed on KSP 1.2.2 running on Windows (64-bit). It is working great and I got EVE working as well and things look fantastic. Many thanks to the developers! I wanted to add the asteroid Ceres--I saw some addons for more bodies including Ceres but they did not look to be up to date and they added a lot more bodies than I needed. I really just wanted Ceres to test out leap frogging an IPT SpaceX type ship to the outer planets. I copied configurations for Mercury and Pluto and combined them to form the cfg file for Ceres. But it does not seem to work--Ceres just doesn't show up anywhere in the solar system map. My .cfg file is in its own directory. I created a cache directory for it in that directory. I looked for errors in the KSP.log and did not find any relating to RSS, Kopernicus, or my Ceres.cfg. The log does show that the config file is read and applied. The flightGlobalsIndex was set one higher than the max I saw in the RSS planet configs (25), not sure if that is right. Anyone have any idea what I am doing wrong? Here is my config file: @Kopernicus:AFTER[Kopernicus] { // Ceres Body { name = Ceres finalizeOrbit = true flightGlobalsIndex = 26 cacheFile = DRN/RSS/CelestialBodies/Cache/Ceres.bin Template { name = Mun removePQSMods = PQSLandControl, PQSMod_VoronoiCraters } Orbit { // Target body name: Ceres (1) // Center body name: Sun (10) // Center-site name: BODY CENTER referenceBody = Sun semiMajorAxis = 413738764346.7532 eccentricity = 0.07936349488056565 inclination = 27.12733949231346 meanAnomalyAtEpochD = 60.016247104516937 longitudeOfAscendingNode = 23.45017277406660 argumentOfPeriapsis = 12.91910266371100 color = 0.776, 0.698, 0.647, 1.0 } Properties { useTheInName = False description = The largest body in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The only dwarf planet within the orbit of Neptune. radius = 473000 mass = 9.393E+20 solarRotationPeriod = False rotationPeriod = 32667.84 tidallyLocked = false initialRotation = 0 isHomeWorld = false timewarpAltitudeLimits = 0 500 3000 3000 10000 30000 60000 100000 biomeMap = RSS-Textures/PluginData/CharonBiomes.png Biomes { Biome { name = Surface value = 1.0 color = 0,0,0,1 } Biome { name = Mordor Macula value = 1.0 color = 1,1,1,1 } Biome { name = Serenity Chasma value = 1.0 color = 1,0,0,1 } Biome { name = Alice Crater value = 1.0 color = 0,1,0,1 } Biome { name = Gallifrey Macula value = 1.0 color = 0,0,1,1 } Biome { name = Ripley Crater value = 1.0 color = 1,1,0,1 } Biome { name = Nasreddin Crater value = 1.0 color = 1,0,1,1 } Biome { name = Macross Chasma value = 1.0 color = 0,1,1,1 } Biome { name = Butler Mons value = 1.0 color = 0.2,0.0,0.0,1 } Biome { name = Argo Chasma value = 1.0 color = 0.0,0.2,0.0,1 } Biome { name = Kaguya-Hime Crater value = 1.0 color = 0.2,0.2,0.0,1 } Biome { name = Kubrick Mons value = 1.0 color = 0.0,0.2,0.2,1 } Biome { name = Vulcan Planum value = 1.0 color = 0.0,0.0,0.2,1 } } ScienceValues { landedDataValue = 7 inSpaceLowDataValue = 6 inSpaceHighDataValue = 5.5 recoveryValue = 6 flyingAltitudeThreshold = 500 spaceAltitudeThreshold = 2500 } } ScaledVersion { type = Vacuum fadeStart = 50000 fadeEnd = 52000 Material { texture = RSS-Textures/CharonColor normals = RSS-Textures/Charon_NRM shininess = 0.2 specular = 0.2,0.2,0.2,1 } } PQS { maxQuadLengthsPerFrame = 0.03 minLevel = 2 maxLevel = 12 minDetailDistance = 8 deactivateAltitude = 87000 fadeStart = 52000 fadeEnd = 67000 Material { saturation = 1.0 contrast = 0.9 tintColor = 1.000,1.000,1.000,0.000 powerNear = 0.6 powerFar = 0.6 groundTexStart = 0 groundTexEnd = 2000 steepPower = 3 steepTexStart = 0 steepTexEnd = 50000 steepTex = BUILTIN/terrain_sand00 steepBumpMap = BUILTIN/Cliff (Layered Rock)_NRM steepNearTiling = 15000 steepTiling = 500 lowTex = BUILTIN/snow lowBumpMap = BUILTIN/quiet lowNearTiling = 1000 lowMultiFactor = 30 lowBumpNearTiling = 5000 lowBumpFarTiling = 200 midTex = BUILTIN/snow midBumpMap = BUILTIN/quiet midNearTiling = 1000 midMultiFactor = 30 midBumpNearTiling = 5000 midBumpFarTiling = 200 highTex = BUILTIN/snow highBumpMap = BUILTIN/quiet highNearTiling = 1000 highMultiFactor = 30 highBumpNearTiling = 5000 highBumpFarTiling = 200 lowStart = 0 lowEnd = 0.6 highStart = 0.8 highEnd = 1 globalDensity = 0 } Mods { VertexColorMap { map = RSS-Textures/CharonColor.dds order = 10 enabled = true } VertexHeightMap { map = RSS-Textures/PluginData/CharonHeight.dds offset = 0 deformity = 10264.0 scaleDeformityByRadius = false order = 20 enabled = true } VertexSimplexHeight { seed = 2211221 deformity = 200.0 octaves = 12.0 persistence = 0.7 frequency = 10.0 enabled = true order = 102 } VertexSimplexNoiseColor { seed = 45 blend = 0.125 colorStart = 0,0,0,1 colorEnd = 1,1,1,1 octaves = 12.0 persistence = 0.7 frequency = 2.0 enabled = true order = 200 } VertexHeightNoiseVertHeight { seed = 1283704385 frequency = 8 octaves = 9 persistance = 0.6 heightStart = 0 heightEnd = 1 deformity = 1200 mode = Low } } } } }

Glad you like it. Hopefully it will continue. Though I kind of think we need to wait for the wheel problem to be fixed before serious additions are done. Clearly it makes runway use harder than it should be. I currently have been avoiding aircraft with 1.1.2.

You are very welcome and glad you find it useful. I have not given up, just want to blend my efforts with those that have been doing work on it recently. -Kramer

Kramer checking in here. I am very sorry I have not had time to maintain this project. I very much appreciate those who have picked up where I had left off. Thank you linuxgurugamer! I am willing to help and do what I can. Trying to figure out how to do that. The Navball overlay code was always a hack in 1.0.5 cause I think there was no way to officially get some info about it that was really needed. Now with 1.1 allowing it to move and resize in stock game I could see it would need some serious work.

I am seeing an occasional crash when I hide the flag on a tank. Does not happen every time, but often enough. Whole game crashes to desktop. Sorry for the vague report. I do have other mods installed. This is the last things in the log: [LOG 17:47:11.343] Updating part flag from on flag changed PartMessage [LOG 17:47:11.344] Model updating attach nodes; names length: 4 [LOG 17:47:11.345] node name: top [LOG 17:47:11.346] node name: top2 [LOG 17:47:11.346] node name: top3 [LOG 17:47:11.347] node name: top4 [LOG 17:47:11.348] Model updating attach nodes; names length: 4 [LOG 17:47:11.349] node name: bottom [LOG 17:47:11.350] node name: bottom2 [LOG 17:47:11.351] node name: bottom3 [LOG 17:47:11.352] node name: bottom4 [LOG 17:47:11.355] Updating part flag from on flag changed PartMessage [LOG 17:47:11.360] Model updating attach nodes; names length: 4 Sadly there is no crash dump or anything else that I can find. This is with the 4.31.110 release.

First want to say that I love this mod; I can't contemplate playing KSP now without it. It is just about perfect. One bug I noticed that remains with the 4.31.110 release you just made concerns the LC2-POD. It seems that the ascent tank variant disappears quite often on a reload or scene change or something. I select "ascent tank" variant and they show up as expected. If I save the craft and reload in the VAB the tanks are no longer visable. It is very reproducible for me. Another question: are the lander tanks that had selectable landing legs, solar panels, etc. not supported under 1.1 KSP? I loved using those for landers and can't find them. Maybe I just am looking in the wrong place. -Thanks, Kramer

I also noticed trouble slowing down with a simple capsule like yours. I have a good bit of experience with 1.0.5 with the identical capsule (parachute, Mk 1, heat shield) and never had trouble slowing down with all kinds of different trajectories. The ship seemed to have tons of drag once it got down to 20000m or so. In 1.1.2 I just barely am able to get the chute deployed in time--speed drops to safe deploy speed about 4000m or less and with chute deploy time, it does not start braking seriously until 400m from sea level. This is very different from 1.0.5. So my question is, I have seen in previous posts that it is claimed that there were no changes to the atmosphere and its effects. But some ships are less draggy. So is the heatshield less draggy? Or is it just not true--that the atmo effects have changed? -Kramer

Thanks lynwoodm, I appreciate that!

Glad you got it working---I forgot that you had to do that to make it work. I will edit the readme to point that out. Sorry about that. The main issue with the implementation is that you have to be in control of the calls to make components. I am not sure if that would be the case for part modules. I know it is a problem for vessel modules because the KSP internals are creating the component on their own and I cannot intercept it. I have a feeling the same may be true of part modules. But I am just guessing--I have never created a part module so I am not familiar with the way it works.

Just a note to those following this--the moderators moved it to the Add-on Development forum at my request.

I just uploaded v0.2 of the mod. Just a few tweaks and bug fixes: Add first cut at RW27 approach to KSC to default flight plans; thanks to Van Disaster for contributing. Change window IDs to hopefully now be unique and not collide with PA mod. Make hitting the target speed button with the auto-throttle off turn it on. Make app launcher button see the correct state of the GUI window so it should always toggle properly.

Great to hear that it works in RSS!

That's great, thanks for contributing! The fun thing about creating an approach is you get to name all the waypoints; you'll be immortalized I took what you had and tweaked it a little and made it just ILS 27 without any extra points. Seems to work OK. I went and took things a little farther south, because I think with our spaceplanes we need a big wide turn for the course reversal. I added an extra point to make a box at the end when it turns around. You can try it out if you like: FlightPlan { planet = Kerbin name = KSC ILS 27 description = KSC ILS 27 V1.0 WayPoints { WayPoint { Vertical = true lat = -2.0 lon = -74.8 alt = 10000 name = DONUT } WayPoint { Vertical = true lat = -2.0 lon = -70.75 alt = 5000 name = CAMEL } WayPoint { Vertical = true lat = -0.2 lon = -70.75 alt = 3500 name = THRED } WayPoint { Vertical = true IAF = true lat = -0.0582111 lon = -71.75 alt = 2500 name = KSC 27 IAF } WayPoint { Vertical = true FAF = true lat = -0.0582111 lon = -73.25 alt = 1000 name = KSC 27 FAF } WayPoint { Vertical = true RW = true lat = -0.050185 lon = -74.47 alt = 110 name = KSC RW27 FLARE } WayPoint { Vertical = true Stop = true lat = -0.0485981 lon = -74.73595 alt = 67 name = KSC RW27 STOP } } }

Thanks you so very much Crzyrndm, I found your source very readable. I hope you don't mind me hacking it apart. I thought I was just not understanding something about the Preset() call--there were a number of things where I just couldn't quite figure it out. Don't have any education other than what I read on wikipedia about PID controllers. Thanks again!

The file DefaultFlightPlans.cfg has sample flight plans in it. You can just copy them out of that file. I did not want to install a FlightPlans.cfg file cause I was worried it would overwrite a user's carefully crafted plans when they update the mod. Yes, I think I am going to make the next version improve on this. I think that we can already use multiple config files for different planets or even spaceports. But I think I need to add spaceports as an organizational field so that you can see flight plans associated with a particular spaceport. That way all the KSC approaches will be together and with something like Kerbinside each spaceport will be separate. Thinking of maybe using a search field to pull up the plans you want to look at. Well you can get lat/lon using the debug window. The only place you have to be super accurate is on the runway start and end points. The best way to get those is to just land or start a craft on the runway and then taxi it to both ends and record the lat/lon. It would be nice to be able to make a waypoint at that lat/lon automatically but just did not want to put in yet another GUI for it. Yes, that would be nice, but it only comes up when working on creating approaches. It would be very hard to implement. When I was developing the approach flight plans I would create a quick-save with my craft stable out a little from the first points of the approach. That way I could modify the approach and then F9 back to that point and try it out. You can even do this for the final segment if your craft is slower and stable to test the actual flare and land out. Oops, sorry about that. I need to change the unique ID that identifies windows. I think I am using the same ones that were in PA. I will fix that. Thanks for trying to make an approach and the feedback. If you get a workable approach to RW27 I would be happy to include it in the built-in approaches.

It sounds like you are doing the right things. Anyway you can post more of the KSP.log file? And if it is easy to put the entire project up somewhere I could look over all the source.

I edited my first post and added a video with a demo flight. Hope that is helpful.

Oops, my bad. Did not realize there was a forum specifically for that. How do I get an admin to move the post? I presume I cannot do that myself? -Thanks

A waypoint database could make sense. I am afraid I was going kind-of quick and dirty at that point. For approaches I am not sure how much you would really reuse them. They are pretty specific to the approach. For general "fly around some waypoints" use it would make a lot more sense. Although I refer to the approaches as "ILS" they are really modeled after the real-life GPS approaches (LPV) which I normally would fly with the autopilot all the way in from some initial fix. So that is how I made this work. Regarding your snapshot--good news is you are on course and glideslope! Bad news--you are going like a bat out of hell. You definitely need to be able to slow down when using the RW09 approach. You just cannot get low fast because of the mountains and so you cannot start really slowing until the initial fix. If your plane does not have some type of braking (either natural drag or airbrakes or ...) you may have problems. But this is just like in real life. If you come into final approach in a citation jet at 250 knots you will not be able to get it down and stopped. So speed management is important. For spaceplanes that cannot slow down while descending this approach would probably just not work. So a RW27 approach would be useful in those cases. It can be made to be have a much more gradual descent over the water. It manages your speed only once you are inbound to the IAF fix. Before that you have to manage it yourself. I don't think I would want to tackle speeds before that fix. You can leave it in GS mode once you are inbound to any fix. But I normally do not enable GS until I am level at the next fix altitude and passing it. Also, I really need to make it save the approach speeds on a per-vessel basis. It is annoying to have to set them each time. But v0.2 for that. Not sure about the F2 key--was not even aware that was there. I probably disabled it without knowing. Thanks for trying it out!