seanth

Update 0.2.0.0 (2014.09.29): -Added version file for Automatic Version Control (AVC) mod integration (suggested by Bit Fiddler) -Added file paths to resources for use by Alternate Resource Panel mod. -Fixed purple icon in toolbar at Space Center view (bug reported by Bit Fiddler) -In-flight button moved -Made "Easy" play mode a mass-balanced version of Classic (mass balance bug reported by KBluey). Seanth is punching himself in the head. Note: there are no plans to alter how Classic works. -Most "Easy" play mode parts shifted into Utility vs Classic having them in "Science". -Some "Easy" play mode parts have slightly different description compared to "Classic" to make it easier to go from Easy to Hard. -Misc spelling and other fixes

Update 0.2.0.0 (2014.09.29): -Added version file for Automatic Version Control (AVC) mod integration (suggested by Bit Fiddler) -Added file paths to resources for use by Alternate Resource Panel mod. -Fixed purple icon in toolbar at Space Center view (bug reported by Bit Fiddler) -In-flight button moved -Made "Easy" play mode a mass-balanced version of Classic (mass balance bug reported by KBluey). Seanth is punching himself in the head. Note: there are no plans to alter how Classic works. -Most "Easy" play mode parts shifted into Utility vs Classic having them in "Science". -Some "Easy" play mode parts have slightly different description compared to "Classic" to make it easier to go from Easy to Hard. -Misc spelling and other fixes

Oops. CRP ORS alphabet soup mix up fixed in post. Thx.

I feel like I should clarify my previous question and intent. Defining the scope: The BioMass mod is designed to work on its own (with the exception of Module Manager for switching difficulty), but it does use use resources that other mods use. To make sure we are not conflicting with other mods, we make sure we are using the same densities as listed in the Open Resource System Community Resource Pack, and to make things even clearer, we have two separate files listing resource definitions. One lists resources that are unique to BioMass, and another lists resources BioMass uses, but which overlap with other mods. For the sake of illustrating my concern, I'll make up a resource that is in the overlap list. Light BioMass Nutrients MicroFlora BioCake Seeds LiquidCO2 KethaneGas PretendResource Food Water Waste WasteWater Oxygen CarbonDioxide Hydrogen Kethane My concern: A player named Bob wants to use Alternate Resource Panel and BioMass. He installs both. We at BioMass provide a icon for PretendResource and define the file path in the resource definition. Later Bob wants in use mod X that _also_ defines PretendResource. mod X maker was good and also provided an icon and file path in their resource definition. Which icon does Alternate Resource Panel use? How can we at BioMass keep from accidentally stomping on mod X's icon when we provide one ourselves? I'm just looking for a sort of best practices guideline.

Yes, and have tried to help the project out by contributing some data.

Thank you so much. That did it, but shouldn't what I was doing have worked too? I tried altering my line to put a space before the {} and it still didn't work. Very frustrating.

I've been experiencing a problem removing a module that has a tag. I have messed with it for a few hours and just can't see what I'm doing wrong. I'm sure it is something simple.... The module as it exists is: MODULE{ name = BioGen tag = Photosynthesis bioLabel = Oxygen Production AlwaysActive = true RequiresAllInputs = true hasMax = true bioIn{ Light = 0.5 ElectricCharge = 5 Nutrients = 0.0001 CarbonDioxide = 0.0008 } bioOut{ Oxygen = 0.0001 } } and the MM line I'm using is: -MODULE[BioGen,Photosynthesis]{} I know I am targeting the correct part because I can change the description using @desctiption. At first I thought there might be some non printing characters in the tag, or maybe there was some space trailing problems, but I just can't find anything wrong. Help?

A question on etiquette: I help with a mod that uses resources that are also used by some other mods. We make sure our mod works by itself, but it also integrates with other mods. Do we package the button icons for the resources we share in common in case the player does not have the other mods installed? -STH

Dev update note Over on the release thread somone mentioned a problem with the Classic setting: We talked a bit about why this problem exists in Classic, but the tl;dr of it is that the original release of BioMass (which is what Classic is meant to be) wasn't meant to be mass balanced. I think we have a solution, though. Well, I know we have a solution. We just need to decide how to implement it. Roboto and I are conferring on some ideas. That is all.

It's true that parts use hydrogen. But it makes no sense to have a tank that holds "hydrogen". A tank would hold compressed hydrogen...unless it was just a balloon. Know what I mean? The hydrogen compressor allows you to compress/release it from MonoPropellant tanks. Is hydrogen MonoPropellant? Honestly I don't think so. I think the MonoPropellant is ethylene oxide (C2H4O). But for now we are saying you can compress hydrogen into MonoPropellant. Forgive me <hits self in head> You might be confusing BioMass' atmospheric processor with some other mod's. I just checked and we use IntakeAir. Having said that, the atmospheric processor has not received a lot of love from us. We've been focusing on the greenhouse stuff more. Ok. That's a bug. There should be two versions of the button: The one that appears in the Space Center view (where you change difficulty) and one that appears during flights (which allows you to monitor craft). Can you check and see which (or both) is not working as desired?

I believe it is compatible with Tac Life Support. Give it a try and if you run into problems making it work with TAC-LS, let us know and we'll try and fix it.

I'm sorry to hear about that. If you still have an older version of BioMass you could grab the hydrogen tank and put it in the newer version, but your are correct: we removed the red tank because it was sort of unnecessary. I mean, why have a tank for holding uncompressed hydrogen? As a general note, I am fairly certain the test version of BioMass we have out _will_ break older saved games. As Roboto warned, don't install the new test version unless you are willing to start new save-games.

Well, we definitely want to hear from you, then. Give the new version a shot, and let's see if we can get things up and running for you. Along the way maybe we'll be able to improve things, too. Seriously, PM me.

We don't When BioMass was first released, it was meant to be just a fun addition for casual players. For that reason, things are not mass balanced. Hell, there are some parts that make some resources appear de novo. When I came around and started bugging Roboto, I wanted to make things harder and mass balanced...which led to greater complexity. KSP as made by Squad isn't really made for mass balanced conversions of one (or more) resource into another. I have a whole spreadsheet dedicated to taking molar mass chemical rxns and resource densities and outputting the corresponding masses and liter input/outputs...and then doing a sanity check to see whether the masses balance. That last bit is because different mods use different (sometimes odd) resource densities, and you need to math things to make sure. I believe we can rework things so we have a mass balanced version of Classic, but that wouldn't be Classic anymore. It'd be Easy. Having said that, maybe Easy should be exactly that: a mass balanced version of Classic. Right now Easy is closer to what Hard will be in terms of reaction complexity. What do people think? Should we alter Classic and make it not Classic, or make Easy a mass balanced version of Classic?

To help highlight the differences between Classic and other levels of play, I put together a first draft of a series of tables showing the inputs, outputs, and whether a process can be turned on/off. It can be found at https://www.dropbox.com/s/a9aweh6oot9yavq/BioMassGuideV1.pdf?dl=0 Hopefully, it will be apparent that the parts do the same things, but Classic is less complex. Things which are biological or chemical processes that the player can not turn on/off are shown in thick green lines. I'm sure there are typos ect, but hey, closer to a guide.

That is correct. Roboto wrote a brand new generator that should allow parts to create the illusion that things grow even when the craft is not focused. There's a biomass resource monitoring window as well. I hacked up some code that lets players change their play difficulty in game. Having said that, some of our parts do generate KethaneGas on Easy and higher, so BioMass and the Kethane mod are built to play well together. We do have one part that would work well with the ORS, but our focus has been on getting other aspects of BioMass working. After we feel like things are working correctly, I'll start thinking more about atmospheric resource extraction and ORS I am aware of it, but have not looked at it closely. I will look closer at it, though, since you brought it up.

To help distinguish the difference between Classic and other levels of play, I say down and put together some tables showing the difference between parts. The first draft can be seen at https://www.dropbox.com/s/a9aweh6oot9yavq/BioMassGuideV1.pdf?dl=0 Things which are outlined in green boxes are biological/chemical processes that the player can not turn on/off. As you can see, the parts function in the same way, but Easier and up is more complex.

Since you said "food greenhouse," I will assume you are playing in Classic mode. The Classic parts do not try to maintain a mass balance. The massive energy consumption should only happen when the greenhouse is in light (sunlight) or when the lights are on. As I understand it, Roboto set the electrical usage fairly high in the original BioMass release so the parts were not making "free" food, oxygen, and fuel. I will ping Roboto and get him to weigh in. EDIT: I just re-read your post and realized I didn't answer your question about seeds. The Classic version does not produce seeds. Easy, Medium and Hard do. If you don't like how Classic is working, may I be so bold as to suggest that you try Easy? Easy, Medium, and Hard aim for maintaining mass balanced reactions, though things need to be play tested and tweaked.

Not sure this would be of interest, but back when some of the people on the forum were circumnavigating Kerbin by boat, we were throwing names on some landmarks. Anyway, I like maps, and since you are providing place names....

Very cool, and thanks. I'll keep checking back. Excellent work on things, btw,

Do you have a recommendation on a building for launching boats. I don't mean a in-the-water-boat-appears there launch. I mean a ramp I can drive a boat trailer down to release a boat. I was looking at the dock model in the Coastal Extras pack, but the ramp is blocked by the traffic lights, limiting the size of things. Any chance you could release a dock version without those size-exclusion traffic lights at the top of the ramp?

I will definitely take a look. There's no plan to replace the converter BioMass uses right now since it's tied in with the new control window and has some customization, but I will looksie.

If the TAC Generic Converter was a stand-alone and not bundled with TAC-LS, I bet practically everyone would use it. Squad's is less than ideal.

Just a quick note that might be of interest. The BioMass mod is testing out in-game difficulty switching making use of Module Manager. Right now it requires a manual alt+F11 reload of the database, but we're moving toward a one-button solution (vs the present 2-button implementation) A video illustrating how it works is a part of the latest announcement at http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/62631-BioMass-Ongoing-Development?p=1430740&viewfull=1#post1430740 Just sharing since I am not sure whether other mods have used module manager to hide/show/change parts as part of difficulty toggling.

Yeah. BioMass and TAC-LS both model biological processes, so it makes sense to try and make them play well together, even if we disagree on density bases (5 vs 1).