King Arthur

Better PR. Having rockets and space vehicles that simply look cool are rather important if you want to garner the public's attention and care.

For what it's worth, I've found that STS-style space shuttles are the best of both worlds. Good payload capacity and reasonable funds recovery from recovering the spaceplane/shuttle plus any payload(s) or cargo. I've tried my hand at SSTOs, but the effort spent in designing them to get into space isn't worth it given I've found they always arrive in orbit running on fumes and with little to no practical payload capacity.

When you take a look at the 2.5m->1.25m Rockomax adapter you realize that the nosecone's mass is unholy.

If you think the NCS is bad, then take a look at the Protective Rocket Nosecone Mk7.

The name you're looking for is the ULA, the United Launch Alliance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Launch_Alliance

Rockets look cooler when they have all their boosters still attached.

The problem with nuclear fusion, and really anything that has the word "nuclear" associated with it, is that the public will mercilessly shoot it down immediately with extreme prejudice. Nuclear technology can allow for many great things, but we're going to need to address the many years of nuclear fear-mongering most of the public has been subject to before we can even imagine putting nuclear technologies into normal use for something like spaceflight. For what it's worth, RTGs haven't been shot down, but then it's hard for the general public to think of the word "nuclear" from just the three letters "RTG".

We once twice actually had 2 manned space stations flying together, the first time being the Mir and the Salyut 7, with one of the highlights being a station-to-station flight: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mir https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salyut_7 And the second time being the ISS in its very early days and Mir, though by this time Mir was mostly a ghost of its former glory due to its age.

While the suggestion of using symbolic links has merit, I can't help but think (with all due respect) that perhaps this suggestion is grossly overestimating the level of an average gamer's knowledge and familiarity with a computer.

Unless you've been living under a rock for the past half-century or so, it's a well-known fact that China steals the technology of others like nobody's business given even the slightest of chances. I'm sure the Sukhoi engineers can tell you all about how the Flanker was copy-stolen to hell and back, among many other things. Now don't get me wrong, conspiracy theories are bad, but it is also equally bad to deny that China would steal the technology behind the SLS, the Falcon Heavy, or whatever else, because they have a historic precedence of stealing others' work.

Russia's planning on making OPSEK, initially using the Russian Orbital Segment from the ISS when it's decomissioned. Russia has always held the lead with space stations and long-term habitation of LEO, the ISS would literally not be able to operate without the Russian Orbital Segment, so I suspect this will actually become a reality presuming funding doesn't become too precarious an issue. I personally don't expect anything of the Chinese space program though, including their stations. If there's a space program that's an even bigger political farce than the SLS right now, it's the Chinese.

So long as The Original Three keep their special orange suits I'm all for color differentiation.

http://ark.intel.com/products/81016/Intel-Core-i5-4210U-Processor-3M-Cache-up-to-2_70-GHz?q=Intel%C2%AE%20Core%E2%84%A2%20i5-4210U%20Processor%20%283M%20Cache,%20up%20to%202.70%20GHz%29 It'll probably run KSP fine, but I wouldn't expect anything particularly spectacular.

I debated whether I should place the onus there on NASA (the people who do), the US Congress (the people who order), or hell, the US President (the guy who says) as I was writing it, but ultimately I think we can both agree that third-parties are not to blame for the lack of missions and payload for the SLS.

Let's be fair here, the lack of missions and payload for the SLS is a self-inflicted problem because NASA has not laid out a solid plan for the SLS. The SLS isn't a "please contract me!" launcher like the ones the ULA operate, if NASA doesn't provide missions and payload for the SLS there is very little reason for its existence besides politics. Also, I've heard (though I've not gone about confirming this) that the market for heavy lifters is really low in demand with the Delta IV Heavy not flying as often as one would think given it is the heaviest lifter in the world at the moment. If the D4H is having problems finding customers, what chance does the SLS have?

I haven't watched it, but then again I don't watch movies to begin with.

You just answered yourself why SLS is a political stunt (or as it's sometimes called, the Senate Launch System), as follows: NASA might be serious, but the US Congress which funds NASA and decides its budget is not. This is precisely why the SLS is around, because we don't have a NASA-operated launcher or manned space vehicle with the retirement of the Space Shuttle. The US Congress doesn't care where SLS is heading, they simply want rockets so that the jobs that would otherwise be lost by the ending of the Space Shuttle program will be kept and the loss of prestige from not operating manned space vehicles can be recovered. If we were truly serious about going to Mars and beyond we would have a solid timetable and a plan already, rather than "yeah, the next Orion flight is in 4 years' time, also we have these two missions planned but no idea beyond that". As for lifters that don't need to be outsourced from SpaceX and co., we have the ULA (United Launch Alliance) which pretty much provides the US government with launchers on demand. We are in no short supply of reliable launchers (Atlas V and their RD-180s not withstanding). I once again point to the Ares I-X. Successful mission, program still axed. Great as it was, this successful Orion test flight guarantees absolutely nothing. Don't get me wrong, seeing NASA doing glorious things will be great. But if we Americans were truly serious about what we were doing then we would have picked up the pace by now.

If I'm being perfectly honest I don't even expect the SLS to fly period, let alone reach Mars in the 2030s. We launched the Ares I-X back a couple years ago as part of the Constellation program, and despite a successful mission the program was still killed off. I'm not holding my breath for the Orion/SLS just because we had a successful Orion test flight. In addition, the SLS currently has no planned missions beyond SLS-2/EM-2 which is the only manned Orion mission (coincidentally the first manned flight of Orion?) slated to rendezvous with and investigate an asteroid that would be brought to lunar orbit at an earlier date. We don't have a roadmap for going to Mars (or even the Moon...), there's nowhere near adequate funding to make the SLS worthwhile. What the Orion/SLS is is literally a rocket to nowhere and a money sink. If NASA gets the proper level of necessary funding and actually lays out a solid, thought-out plan on how to utilize the SLS and ultimately reach Mars I may reconsider my negative outlook on the whole thing. Otherwise though, I don't expect for any of us to land on Mars before the 2100s+ at least, and certainly not by NASA/SLS.

Constellation had a Moon lander to complement Orion, I think it was called Altair. It got axed along with the rest of the Constellation program, with Orion being the sole survivor. I'm both happy and saddened about the Orion launch. Happy that the launch and mission went as planned with success, saddened that we're paying for a crewed vehicle and an eventual heavy-lifter that we still have no plan what to do with.

If I'm being very optimistic, maybe sometime in the 2100s or 2200s. I don't see us having the will to fork over the time and money to do something that has no practical nor economical gain for the forseeable future. So I vote for 2040 or later.

The stock Mk2 inline docking port has 75 monoprop inside it, though I wasn't aware that its original SP+ version had doors that lined up with the cargo bays. A shame the stock docking port and cargo bay doors don't line up.

@RoverDude: The post you wrote was quite the handful to read, so I apologize in advance if I happen to miss something. I wrote stagnation to mean a mod that is abandoned or is otherwise not being actively developed/supported. Yes, it's a parts pack mod and very unlikely to break from KSP version updates, but the fact remains that the original Bargain Rocket Parts is currently not being worked on by the original developer. I guess this also answers your subsequent question here in this regard, I spoke of stagnation not to mean anything specific that needed fixing or additional work, just that the mod in question wasn't being actively worked on. Stagnated, stalled, abandoned, etc. is what I meant. I apologize if this was unclear. As far as I saw of that thread, he was repeatedly ragged on for forking the mod with a perceived/actual lack of experience. What I want to state here is that if others wanted to rag on him about his lack of skill, once is enough. He was criticized and he elected to keep on going in spite of that, that discussion should have ended there. Continuing to bring that topic up even after _Augustus_ gave his statement is pointless. Of course, _Augustus_ is also partially to blame for how that thread went since he did undoubtedly lash out at you in an unreasonable way. What is clear is that thread was handled by everyone in a very inappropriate manner that should be addressed for the future. The terms of the license state, in a nutshell, that deriative works can be made with the requirement that the original creator(s) be credited and deriative works share the same license. What _Augustus_ did was fully within his rights and cannot be construed as destructive to the mod since the license specifically allows for it. The act of forking an otherwise unsupported mod is also not counterproductive or destructive to the modding community, and if his fork does in fact prove to be of inferior worksmanship then the forked mod will naturally die out without the need for any fussing about. On the other hand, the act of pestering and harrassing _Augustus_ even though he did nothing wrong as far as creating his own fork of the mod is in fact counterproductive and destructive. The arguments made there was that he lacked experience and dissatisfaction in the direction of the forked mod, but stating that concern to him once is enough, any further like how things went and it becomes harrassment without any chance of producing anything constructive. I actually did wait to see if you'll be creating your own fork as you stated, and I wasn't going to write up this thread if your fork was already out since that would mean at least something positive would have remained from that whole fiasco. For one reason or another though, which I'm not going to discuss about since your time is your business, that fork hasn't been made yet, and thus the situation remains that the original mod remains without active development/support and we have nothing to show for killing off a fork that did have an active dev working on it. Honestly, it's anybody's guess what _Augustus_ would have done with his fork of Bargain Rocket Parts because we killed it off before it could even get anywhere. He might have done great things to it or he might have done horrible things to it, but we will never know because we cracked the egg before the ugly duckling even hatched. I stated that anybody who has a problem should create their own fork because I stand by the philosophy of the old saying that I'm sure you've heard of before: If you want something done right, do it yourself. Action speaks louder than words, and perhaps more truly too. If _Augustus_'s response to concerns that his skill level might not be appropriate for the mod was not satisfying to you or others, then rather than repeatedly egging him on it that discussion should have ended there and disgruntled users and/or devs should just make their own fork to show how it's "properly" done if it bothers them so much. The license permits deriatives/forks with the proper groundwork after all. As far as your advice to me that I be more careful in what I ask for, I will state that I do not regret saying what I said back then. If someone wants something done right, they should do it themselves rather than endlessly complain. -------- In closing, please understand that I am not aiming this thread at you or anyone specific, RoverDude; I am not "out to get you" so to speak. For what it's worth, I appreciate the work you've done (that warp drive is awesome) and respect your skills and experience as a KSP mod developer. It's true that the lack of a fork from you, as of writing, was one of the factors in me writing this topic, but I am presuming that you are simply busy and/or have other pressing matters and I am not going to inquire or discuss that as your time is your business and not mine. Rather than aiming at someone, I wanted to create a discussion about what happened so that we can hopefully prevent similar occurences in the future. A person should never be harrassed for doing something that he is legally permitted to do, witnessing what transpired in that thread was painful and benefitted noone. A mod developer should never have to worry about or be subjected to being attacked for a perceived lack of skill and/or disgruntlement with his work simply from just forking a mod as legally permitted.

I'm sure not everyone pays attention to all the threads in the add-on/mod subforums, so before I begin I'd like to lay out the context for this thread by linking to this thread, a now dead fork of the original Bargain Rocket Parts mod that is itself in a state of stagnation after the original developer moved on. To reiterate what happened in a nutshell, last week a popular mod was forked (as permitted by license terms!) by another developer in order to keep the mod alive. This is nothing unusual, we see it every once in a while when a mod developer leaves or wants to move on to other things. What was unfortunate about this particular incident is that the developer that forked the original mod was harrassed by other community members and even other fellow mod developers for choosing to fork and maintain the mod. This ultimately resulted in moderator intervention in the thread, the forked mod being dropped, the forking developer leaving the aftermath in disgust, the original mod still being left in a state of stagnation, and leaving the community with a very negative, destructive atmosphere and precedent. Thankfully what happened this time was an isolated incident, but as a player of KSP and someone who appreciates the work of mod developers and their work, this entire incident was just painful to watch and I see nothing that will prevent this from occuring again. As members of this community, I feel that this sort of behavior should not be tolerated. It is counterproductive and destructive to the entire modding scene and harbors an air of animosity. To us players and mod developers, I ask: What can we do to police ourselves and work to prevent behavior like this? Given that the mod was forked legally as permitted by the terms of the license, there was absolutely no grounds for this incident to ever happen. To the moderators and administrators, I ask: Will there be any protocols and/or rules placed to prevent such incidents occuring in the future? The moderator intervention was appreciated, but the incident still ended in a way that benefits noone and discourages prospective developers from forking mods. Thank you for reading, I apologize if the topic at hand is more serious and heavy than usual but it just didn't feel right leaving this incident in the state of ruins it is and doing nothing about it.

The Delta IV launchers are all expendable by design, they are not reusable.

As far as I'm aware, simulation in the background works as of 0.25. I alt-tab out a lot and never noticed the simulation stopping anywhere except if I were in the KSC scene.