GreenWolf

I'm going to chime in with the people who are opposed to the addition of social features. It was bad when Steam did it, it was bad when Nexus did it, it was bad when Curse did it, it would be bad here. If the purpose of SpaceDock is to be a mod hosting site, it should be just that. Ratings, user reveiws, etc... are just excess fluff that distracts from the content.

Or, alternatively, you could handle the metadata yourself so that things like this don't happen. I have over 130 mods installed. I'm not going to manually manage all of them when CKAN exists. Anyone who uses more then maybe a dozen mods is going to feel the same way.

Then Karbonite should be delisted as dependency on CKAN and CRP listed instead.

For those wanting a workaround, quicksaving and quickloading will allow you to time warp if you do it before the scene fully loads.

I'd like to kindly request a USI pack that doesn't have Karbonite as a dependency. Not even UKS has Karbonite as a dependency, and for those of use running heavy mod loads who just want USI Life Support, having to install Karbonite is a non-starter.

Count me in as another voice for monoprop powered probes. I've had great success with them in both stock and 6.4x scales. It's easily feasible to make a compact monoprop probe with more delta-v than a similarly sized LFO probe, if only because of lighter engines. Plus it simplifies a lot of tankage and such if you ever need them to dock with things (as is the case here).

In all fairness, it is a pretty easy name to pick. I mean, even Apollo 9 called their CSM Gumdrop. I suppose this does raise the question though: Why are so many spacecraft shaped like gumdrops?

Yes. If you just want to change Kerbin's rotation, drop the following into your GameData folder as a .cfg file (which you can do by saving the following config into a .txt file and changing the end to .cfg): @Kopernicus:BEFORE[SigDim2]:NEEDS[SigDim] { @Body:HAS[#name[Kerbin]] { @PlanetDimensions[3] = 4 } }

Rings are also handled by automatically. So are clouds, if you have any cloud packs installed.

The configs I use (which I settled on after some tweaking, and which I have been continually refining) are provided here: These configs will give you planets and orbits scaled up by a factor of 6.4x (just like 64k), a Kerbin atmosphere height of 90 kilometers, and terrain that is about 1.6 times taller than stock terrain. This preserves the appearance of mountains and the like while preventing things from getting too "spiky" like in 64k. The highest mountain on Kerbin with these configs is around 10 km tall. I also highly recommend using SMURFF alongside any rescales (hence why I provided SMURFF configs as well).

@davidy12 It doesn't need any specific configs to work with OPM, it will scale up planet packs automatically. The only thing you might have to worry about is tidal locking of parent bodies to their moons (although not moons to their parent bodies), and that can be handled with a few small planet specific adjustments. If you want a set of 6.4x scale configs, you can try the ones I suggested. I'm also working on configs to handle correcting tidal locking of planets that need it, and will probably end up bundling them with a few other configs and mod manager patches to make 6.4x playthroughs easier for people to setup.

Chapter 9 Plum Full of Problems **** The first problem occured only a few minutes into the launch. "MECO!" Bill shouted, as the two gravities of acceleration pushing them towards space vanished. "Staging." Valentina kept her view focused on the flight readouts in front of her. "Explosive bolts are good. Separation is clean." "Ignition!" The rocket started to lurch forward as the second stage fired. It was at that point that something exploded. "What was that?" Valentina asked, her hand frozen above the abort button. At this stage of flight it would do nothing for them. "Not us," Bill said, checking his engineering console. "Looks like it was the interstage on the first stage." "We blew it up?" "Yeah. We were too close when we fired the second stage." She frowned, remembering that Jeb had done the same thing on Gumdrop 2. She should have been more careful. "Any damage to the second stage?" "Not that I can tell." "Nothing to worry about then." The rocket continued its ascent. **** The second problem occurred during the Minmusian transfer burn. "How are those engines?" Valentina asked. "Running a bit hot, but temperature is holding steady," Bill replied. "Trans stage will burnout in thirty seconds." Valentina frowned. They had more time than that left in the burn. "That leaves us short 200 meters per sec." She flicked on the radio. "CAPCOM, we don't have enough delta-v in the trans stage to finish the burn. I'm going to run the trans stage dry, decouple it, and then swing around to finish the burn with the service module." "What?" This from both Bill and Gemcie, who were both now looking very alarmed. <Val, are you insane?> Jeb asked. "There's no way the service module has enough delta-v to do a direct abort at this stage. We'll finish the burn, swing past Minmus, and drop back down to Kerbin." As if on cue, the transfer stage cut-out the moment she finished speaking. "Bill, decouple the trans stage!" The engineer flipped the switch on his console that would fire the explosive bolts. Four small pops resonated through the hull of the spacecraft, indicating that the bolts had fired. That was when the third problem occurred. "The trans stage isn't decoupling!" Bill shouted. "Why not?" "I don't know! The bolts fired, but it's still stuck to the Sugar Plum." He paused. "We're going to have to cut it loose." Valentina frowned, thinking back to a moment several weeks ago. Thermal expansion of the interstage decouplers. "No. I have a better idea." Taking the controls, she started rotating the spacecraft back and forth. "What are you doing?" "Improvising." With a scrape and a lurch, the transfer stage slid off the bottom of the Sugar Plum lander and tumbled away. Valentina gave a shout of triumph, then spun the entire spacecraft 180° around and fired up the service module engine. They were going to Minmus one way or another. **** "I've done the math, and we still have enough delta-v to finish the mission," Valentina said. The other two kerbals looked at her in disbelief. The last two weeks had been spent in relative silence as they watched Minmus grow larger each day. "I thought we had agreed on aborting the mission," Gemcie said. "That was when we thought we weren't going to have enough delta-v," Valenina countered. Bill held up a hand, stalling further argument. "How?" "The lander. It has almost twice as much fuel as it needs to do a safe landing and take off. Same deal with the service module. If we siphon some of the lander's fuel, we'll have enough to do the insertion burn and the ejection burn, and still have enough to land." "Those are our saftey margins," Bill said. "You want us to burn off all our safety margins." "Not all of them. We can leave enough fuel in the service module to do the ejection burn before landing, and still have a few hundred meters per sec left in the lander." She looked between the two of them. "Well?" Bill frowned. "I want to check your math first... but, if you're right... well, how could I pass up the chance to land on Minmus?" The two of them looked to Gemcie. The scientist had never been to space before this mission, and had spent most of the flight in nervous silence. "Suppose you leave the service module with enough fuel to burn home. What happens if you're wrong about the lander? What if you're trapped on the surface? I can't fly the ship home by myself." "You wouldn't be doing it yourself. You'd have everyone back on Kerbin guiding you through it. All you'd have to do is point prograde and burn when they tell you." The other kerbal frowned anxiously. "I... alright. Let's do it." Valentina smiled. "Minmus, here we come." **** "CAPCOM, I'm beginning my spacewalk over to the Sugar Plum." <Val, I'm going to tell you again, I really don't think this is a good idea.> "Jeb, if you're gonna keep nagging me about this then put down the headset and get Orwig on the line." She heard an exasperated sigh in response. <Alright. You're drifting away from the craft, make a correction burn.> "Got it. Alright, I'm at the hatch. Starting the depressurization sequence." <Yep, we see it. Good to know that the telemetry is working, at least.> "Alright, I'm inside. Bringing the systems out of hibernation. Tell Bill to get over here, I need a second pair of hands." <He's heading over now.> A few minutes later, the hatch was pulled open again and Bill crawled inside. He climbed over to the engineering console and began flipping switches. "Getting some alarms over here. Apparently the Plum's not happy about us draining some of its fuel." "Tell it to quit crying and get those engines prepped." "Already on it." The next few minutes passed in silence as they worked to prepare the lander for descent. "Alright, system warmup is complete. Should I retract the docking latches?" "Yeah, go ahead and do that now." She flipped on the lander's own comms. "Gumdrop 3, CAPCOM, this is Sugar Plum actual. We're about to undock and begin our descent." <Copy that, Sugar Plum. Fly safe.> **** "There is no greater endeavour than exploration. No sweeter victory than discovery. As I take the first steps upon the surface of Minmus, it is with the knowledge that I walk in the footsteps of all explorers who came before me, and the confidence that my feet shall not be the last on that path." – Valentina **** Commentary So it turns out I overengineered the service module and the lander, and underengineered the transfer stage. Whoops. Still, everything turned out okay in the end. The Sugar Plum will be left in orbit of Minmus, so future missions won't need to carry a lander with them. Instead, I'll stick an RCS tank ontop of the transfer stage that can be used to refuel the lander out at Minmus, and to power some RCS thrusters on it. If I can dock the transfer stage and the Gumdrop before the Gumdrop discards its second stage, I can transfer the remaining fuel in it over to the transfer stage. Throw in a few tweaks to the Spearmint, and I think I can get the transfer stage into orbit with enough fuel to actually send the Gumdrop out to Minmus without the service module needing to fire. I might even be able to fit a small rover onto it to drop doen onto the surface. I have named the landing site of Gumdrop 3 the Plains of Gently, after a friend of mine on IRC. At some point, I'll put together a map of Minmus showing the locations of all the landing sites and the names I've given to various terrain features. Next up: More problems, and the Gumdrop 3 crew return home.

That's incorrect. No CKAN updates are required. Everything that needs to be dealt with is handled on the CKAN end of things. All you have to do is refresh your copy of the metadata, which CKAN does on startup by default. All you have to do as an end user is wait for all the mod metadatas to update. Most of them already have, but it could be weeks before they all do.

Just wanted to drop in and say thank you for these mods. They're small, unobtrusive, do exactly what they should do and nothing more, and have probably managed to cumulatively save me several hours of time, just by shaving off a few seconds on performing basic, often repeated actions.

I don't have a ton of time to play KSP during the week, so the earliest I can try out the patch will be Friday afternoon. I'll report back and let you know how it goes then (assuming that you and MainSailor haven't already figured it out by then).

For me, it occurs during normal launches, and also when doing simulations in KCT. One thing that I did notice with the KCT simulations is that the bug occured regardless of what planetary body I started the simulation on or whether it was started in orbit or not (which makes very long tests annoying, since you can't quicksave and reload in the sim).

No, I never did figure the root cause of it, but I have found a work around. If you quicksave and then quickload, you can start warping or switch to another nearby ship if you do it before the scene fully loads. I've also found that the phantom acceleration goes away entirely if you come back to the ship after a bit of in-game time has passed. So the only time I ever really see the bug is during launches and occasionally when doing dockings or transfer burns to one of the moons. Amusingly, I've become very good at doing single burn launches or launches with very little coast time (which are more efficient), mainly because it means I don't have to spend a few minutes at 5x physical time warp (yes, 5x physical warp – I have Better TimeWarp) waiting to coast to apoapsis. I'm not even sure if this is a bug caused by Sigma Dimensions or if it's Weird Mod Interactions. Considering the heavy load of mods I run, I am inclined to suspect the latter.

This is easily possible with even the most minimal information mods. Heck, with a brachistochrone trajectory (which I did some envelope math advising on for whackjob in another thread. It's entirely possible.) you could do it in one burn.

Chapter 8 Probes and Preparations **** Flash 4 sat on the launchpad, entirely oblivious to the fact that it would be the last of its brethren to do so, at least for the foreseeable future. All of MiniSpace's assests had been reallocated towards the Minmus program, leaving only some surplus hardware for this mission to perform a magnetic survey of Minmus. Flash 4 was also entirely unaware of its mission, because it was a remote controlled probe, and thus incapable of being aware of anything. Certainly not the large and prolonged acceleration from the launch that would have been lethal, or at least seriously inconvenient, to a kerbal crew. Nor the incredibly boring half-month long trip out to Minmus. Not even the fact that it would never be returning home, consigned to orbit the distant moon forever. In the control room, Flight Director Troy reflected upon the advantages of probe missions. **** Nineteen days later, another probe, also bound for Minmus, sat on the launchpad. However, these were the only similarities it bore to Flash 4. This probe was the control point for the Minmus transfer stage, which would set Gumdrop 3 on a course to Minmus before placing itself on an impact trajectory with the icy moon. It would launch with the Sugar Plum lander carried atop it, serving double-duty as the orbital insertion stage of the Spearmint L for itself and the lander. In mission control, the future crew of Gumdrop 3 had gathered to watch the launch of the vehicles that would push them out to Minmus and carry them to its surface. "I don't like this," Bill said again. "Twenty-six days in the parking orbit? All of the oxidizer could--" "We've been over this already," Stanley said, cutting the flight engineer off. "Boil-off will not be an issue." "Structural embrittling." "Hasn't been observed in any missions of similar duration." "Thermal expansion of the interstage decouplers." "Bill, give it a rest already." Valentina said. "Try and enjoy the launch." "Fine," he said. "I still don't like this though." **** A few days later and many thousands of kilometers away, Flash 4 arrived at Minmus. It was, of course, entirely unaware of this fact. **** A week and a half later, the reason for the twenty-six day delay between the two Gumdrop 3 launches was getting ready to launch. We need to get our own launch complex, Captain David mused as he watched the launchpad crews frantically scurrying about to finish the last pre-launch operations. The object which they were focusing their attention on was Thunderhead 1, the first in what would hopefully be a long line of space stations operated by the Rocketry Corps. It was merely a flight prototype to test engineering techniques, but its success -- or failure -- would be instrumental in the design of its eventual successors. The first crew would have to wait to launch until after Gumdrop 3 had reached Minmus. This was the downside of sharing launch facilities with their civilian counterparts. But the advantages, especially in maintenance cost savings, were great enough that both of them were willing to put up with this relatively minor inconvenience. For the moment, at least. David suspected that General Dean would quickly become dissatisfied with the arrangement if their launch rates ever reached his desired goal of one a month. "Hey! Be careful with that!" He shouted at two kerbals he had noticed roughly handling one of the launch umbilicals. Leaving further musing for later, he hurried over to where they were to scold them about safe handling procedures for fuel lines. **** Commentary I'm not entirely happy with this chapter, since it's largely a lot of nothing happening, but there's not really any other way I could show these things happening, since Gumdrop 3 is going to take up an entire post on its own, and that's only counting from the crew launch to the landing. Still, next chapter will have quite a bit happening, as will the chapter after that. Let me just say this: Nothing ever goes exactly as you plan it.

Any chance of getting some CLS configs for Ven's Stock Part Revamp and the community fixes version of Home Grown Rockets? I've already run into a few instances of having crew trapped inside parts because they can't transfer out and can't EVA because the part is missing configs.

The link will keep working, even if the name changes. I believe (although I'm not certain of this) that it uses the leading number before the thread name in the link to figure out which thread it is, with the rest of the name just being a human readable thing to help us know where links lead. As far as I can tell, this number does not change between thread title changes. Regardless of how it does it, links will still lead to the proper posts even if the thread title changes.

This is something that I brought up when we were still on the old forums, but it was less of an issue then because we were able to use GOTO to link to specific points within a post. Please allow us to prevent posts from automerging. It can be incredibly inconvenient if you're intentionally making multiple posts and don't want them merging because you want to be able to link to each post separately (such as in an AAR).

Yeah, let's maybe not merge random discussion threads into a development thread. That seems like a really good way to make the development thread stop being a development thread.

Good to have you back! Your KSP mission reports are some of my favorite, and (in my opinion) easily amongst the best mission reports on the forums. In regards to your question in the OP, you can get a direct link to a post by clicking on the triangle with an open side located in the upper right corner of each post. It gives you a direct link for sharing and such. Embedding it as a hotlink in the forums is pretty easy. Just use the chain icon in the toolbar when editing the post. It'll give you a dialogue box that you can stick the direct link in as well as the text you want it to display.

@Kaerwek If you have a lot of mods installed that are all using the stock toolbar, it can sometimes overflow and hide some icons. Just click and hold on the toolbar and drag it to the left or right to show the hidden ones. This is assuming that there's not a bug involved, of course.