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Maybe I should talk about Nate's Mün Landing and that it has been a hoax. It was only a recording made in some VFX studios... You think it would get me some steam forum points?

It's one of my favorite books in spite of a few things, at least one of which breaks the forum rules to talk about. In addition to the Ansible, there's that pesky antigravity device that was well hidden through most of the book and then dropped in our laps as a megaweapon. However aside from those few things (which are fine. If you don't bend the rules a bit it's not SCIENCE fiction, it's just regular old fiction) the story is frighteningly believable. The 2nd book, Ender's Shadow, is just as good. I heard bad things about the rest so skipped them. The movie was ... fine I guess but it missed out on a lot that I thought was important - including ACTUALLY SHOWING US THE F'IN GAMES I mean that's what I wanted to see I'd happily watch JUST the game for 2 hours and we get like 5 minutes and montage. Grumble grumble grumble. To this day, whenever I'm about to do something difficult, I pause and think to myself, "The enemy's gate is down."

Trouble with landing on Australia's north coast is that you need to overfly Australia to get there, because it will be coming from the south. Pacific Islands would be safer in that regard, but maybe they're not ready to count on a de-orbit burn to accurately bring it down, just yet? Didn't they originally talk about bringing it down NE of Barking Sands on Kauai, but scrubbed that plan because it would require Starship to first be orbital and the de-orbit it?

Side effect: diabetes Superpower: be able to talk to women

I listened in on the last one and was highly disappointed. I will be on a plane during this one, so I am hoping someone else out here is able to summarize all the bullet points they didn't talk about.

@JadeOfMaar This all looks very promising. I've also been thinking about harvesting since I'm a little bit unsatisfied with my current approach of having a few drill types for whole sets of resources but still having them be harvested individually. The idea of sifting useful resources from regolith mixtures has been on my mind for a while, we should talk more about this. I'm interested to see how your converters end up since I think we have quite different approaches there (I just posted some thoughts about chemical converters over in my thread).

The satellite is equipped with a software defined radiometer. At the risk of overexplaining, software defined radio technology replaces what would be physical components with code. It samples the incoming radio signal a bajillion times per second, and computers are so good these days that stuff like filters, modulators, demodulators, attenuators, and a bunch of other stuff, can be emulated via software. You don't need to go out and buy (and have space for) those components, you just drag them into the flowchart. You can also do this at the same time as stuff which would typically already be done in code, in the same interface. Doing math on the data, bit stuffing, printing it to a live spectrum plot, etc. This is traditionally used for amateur radio (and indeed our ground station setup does use software defined radio for some of it) but our mission wants to see if this same technology can be used to make a low cost radiometer. How exactly it works is beyond me, the instrument is the product of the thesis of the professor running the satellite team. While I didn't have to make it, I did have to fix it and modify it and get it to talk nicely with the satellite's main computer, and calibrate it, and figure out how to power the 9 Watt instrument from a power supply that was not designed to power something that power hungry and... If all goes well we should be able to point it at Earth and see how much moisture is in the soil in any given (large) area. The satellite is capable of taking a 10 minute measurement at 1 sample per second every 2 ground station passes, assuming the battery is filled up in that time, although we will start slower. I'm not sure how precise the data will be. I will be ecstatic if we get back data at all, moreso if we can tell apart an ocean from a desert. I'll be ecstatic if the thing even beeps at us. I forget the exact statistic, but half of all university cubesats either don't succeed or don't even get to the point where they can beep (which puts full successes much lower). And I think that number includes graduate teams, our team has been entirely undergraduate except for the professor writing the program for the experiment and doing a lot of administrative stuff. Given the seemingly endless troubles we've had, the issues that were cropping up until the last minute, and many other things, I'm not expecting much. My personal victory threshold is a single occurrence of 2 way communication.

Sorta the first. Group A "We think that everything will be fine, it's probably slightly less certain than what we currently know about Dragon." Group B "We agree, but if anything goes wrong we—us in this room—will be savaged for making the wrong decision when the signs were there to the public, and we ignored a simple contingency plan. I don't think it's the second scenario at all—I talk (usually txt, lol) to someone somewhat involved literally daily (ok, it's like 75% meme exchange ). I think the PAO (and Boeing) have botched this from the start. Minus the unforced PR errors (public now thinking something is terribly wrong), I think they come home on Starliner for sure. Should they pull the trigger on a SpaceX contingency, they would be smart to underline that they think Starliner is fine to return, but one of the points of two providers was to have just this sort of contingency option. Nominal ISS work will seamlessly continue, they will come home in 6 months on Dragon, and Starliner will return by itself for analysis. I would hope that they have actually characterized the problems so that they can simultaneously tell everyone that the added time at ISS allowed them to determine exactly what needs to be fixed on future flights, and they have already begun testing the fixes. If they have to refly the cert mission, they'd have to talk to Amazon about buying one of their Atlas Vs (they're already gonna lose money on this contract, might as well at least succeed).

thats the problem with the little guys, they never seem to have the money to do the research they want. there was some mention on the talk-polywell.org forum that emc2 and others presented at tofe 2024 last month, though nothing seems to have been released to the public on that yet. will keep an eye on that. bussard had wanted to move directly to a full scale demo before he died, when park took over he scaled back to some smaller tests and later to computer models, preferring a more thorough and conservative approach. rather than releasing whatever they had in a desperate attempt for capital (which seems like what fusion startups like to do). im not holding my breath. but with recent iter delays it seems like some venture capitalists might surge fund startups again hoping to get in before iter, though it might turn them off to fusion all together. iter is probibly going to do what it says on the tin, but in another decade or two, again and still require a demo to follow it up. so 50 years?

YEAR -5, DAY SOMETHING - USC-1 Over the next nine years, the Kerbals working at the DLC/A would continue to do extraordinary things. Every launch seemed to be something new. New data, new milestones, the world was entranced by these Kerbals who were seemingly magic. And recently, they’d been toying with the idea of a more advanced rocket. Sounding rockets so far have all been based off of the SNAC-Corporal, which was powered by solid fuel. While it was quite cheap, it was also very inefficient. So far the highest the KAS Rocket Program had gone was about 105km. If they wanted to go any higher and get more valuable data, they’d have to create something powerful and efficient. One of the engineers recalled their middle school science fair project, which was a baking soda volcano. He said that if they used more flammable materials, they would be able to create a similar reaction that could actually lift a rocket. After some thought, they realized that perhaps the idea wasn’t too farfetched. Immediately they got to work trying to find materials that could create an explosive reaction powerful enough to carry a sizable payload into the air. After researching various fuels, they decided on using a fuel simply called “Liquid fuel” and Oxidizer, which when mixed together would combust and release a HUGE amount of force, which could be harnessed into an engine. It isn’t rocket science. The engine born from this concept was the LV-T30 “Reliant” engine, the very first liquid fuel engine! However, they still needed an actual rocket body if any vehicle was to actually be created. After many late night coffee sessions and fireside chatter, the team of engineers was able to create the USC-1, the very first liquid fuel rocket! Its goal was to become the highest flying object created by Kerbals. It took around 8 months to build, even with the fairly saturated budget the team had, but when they finished they had created the most powerful flying machine in Kerbalkind’s history. After some talk, they agreed to broadcast the launch live to all of Kerbin. The UKA would broadcast publicly via the Kerbin Broadcasting Network (KBN). The following photos and quotes are taken from that brodcast. The USC-1 sits poised and ready on the launchpad. Image credit: KBN “This is the Dessert Launch Facility flight tower, reporting clear conditions. We are GO for launch.” - Boston Kerman “Pad technicians confirm all systems look good, and we are GO for launch.” - Wernher Von Kerman “Roger that pad, we are GO for launch in 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, engine startup, 4, 3, 2, 1…” - Boston Kerman USC-1 high in the air. Image credit: KBN “Liftoff on the USC-1!” - Boston Kerman USC-1 at its highest point. Image credit: KBN “Boston, can we get an altitude reading?” - Wernher Von Kerman “Sure thing. We’ve tracked the payload to about… 134km!” - Boston Kerman Yes, that’s right. The USC-1 became the highest flying object Kerbals had ever launched! On board the spacecraft were cameras that, while not of the highest quality, could snap some of the best pictures of Kerbin ever seen. Picture of Kerbin snapped by USC-1. Image credit: KAS, Beyond Once the spacecraft had moved past the zenith of its flight path, its next challenge stood in the way: getting it back to the surface. Research suggests that the atmosphere does not like when you go through really fast, and punishes you by lighting you on fire (or covering you in really, really hot plasma). At first the engineers were sure that the return capsule could survive the heat of re-entry, but now they had second thoughts. However, they thought of a solution in advance. They decided that the capsule would spin like crazy on re-entry. This would evenly distribute heat among the capsules surface, and damage to it would be minimal. Everyone holds their breath during re-entry… USC-1 is caught by cameras once again! Image credit: KBN “Successful parachute deployment confirmed!” - Boston Kerman …and it makes it! The data returned is overwhelming! Pictures from the mission are plastered on newspapers across Kerbin the next day, with headlines like “KAS Does the Impossible”, “Engineering Reaches New Heights”, and “You WON’T Believe what SCIENCE just did! *insane*”. However, the founding five Kerbals were starting to get sick of being stuck to the planet. They believed that there was more for Kerbalkind, beyond the confines of Kerbin. After seeing what the USC-1 did, they knew that its capabilities far exceeded what they expected. Their new plans were to expand the USC-1, with liquid fuel second stages, and capabilities to carry satellites and even Kerbals into Kerbin orbit. However, the KAS couldn’t do any of what they dreamed of. They needed more space to work with, and all the workers and administrators of the rocket program needed their own organization. Then it hit them. Beyond the confines of Kerbin. They rounded up some officials from the rocket program, and off they went again to the capital. This time with more serious ambitions…

late introduction, hi guys, join my discord server to talk with me

Can you talk about it or are you under NDA? If you can talk about it in a limited fashion, what other features does the mod have? Also, I just noticed something. Not all the Titan SRBs have nodes at the base of them. While it makes sense for the side attached ones not to have a bottom node, I think the inline versions at least should have nodes. Would it be possible to get those for all of them?

Crazy how much this poster (From 2023's FUBAR) resembles the poster from Free Guy. Talk about sealing from a source.

Big bad bullying poor little creatives is bound to fascinate decent folk like us. The horror, the horror. Ready Player One was another movie about the little guy winning in a game against badness, though it wasn't really satire. FreeGuy on the other hand made me outraged and laugh at the same time as it is full of gags, a bit subtler than Spaceballs etc but lots of jokes, cameos and nods to well known games and movies. Though after all the talk of corpo suits it may surprise some to learn that this is Taika Waititi as Antwan. Too trendy, not all evil costumes are suits, something tells me Antwan loves his own reflection a little too much...

Anyone's guess on this, really. I imagined that some discovery (perhaps finding all of the alien artifacts) would trigger something in the tech tree that wold enable finding the new star system in the map, and along with the other interstellar tech (we'd already have colonies by that point) would enable sending the first craft to the new star, which would in turn enable navigation within that system. There we'd find more artifacts and the search would continue. Given the Kraken-ness of the artifacts we have, it may be based on a story arc of how the kerbals' progenitors slew the Kraken and learned to fly between the stars - the final stage of the progression would be to find the "Old Kerbin", perhaps populated by Kerbal-like creatures who welcome us home... Maybe, just maybe one day the ex-devs will be able to open up - but I expect this is top of the "You don't talk abouts" on the NDAs.

Floor 5468: The cat, now in a hat, with shiny shoes and spats. Is wondering what to do, with thing 1 and thing 2. Should they go for a walk, or maybe just talk, take in a show, or have food on the go. So many choices, say a chorus of voices. Let's ponder awhile, said the cat with a smile, for now I am free, to have milk with tea.

Yep. In a related vein; I had a talk recently with someone who's generally intelligent & educated on most things. He mentioned that "animals don't really have intelligence; everything they do is based of instinct alone." uh... Back to the instant discussion, however; the common argument seems to center on gross morphological change. If they don't see the beak getting longer/pointier/harder in the lifetime of the bird, it clearly isn't part of the evolutionary process (outside of random change in its gametes). Epigenetics, it seems, is the new kid on the block. Epigenetic inheritance can be important for adaptation, especially in cases where the available genetic variation is limited. Firstly, epigenetic inheritance, like phenotypic plasticity, can enable survival in new environments before genetic adaptation evolves (Burggren 2016). Secondly, the rate of spontaneous gains and losses of individually methylated sites (i.e. the epimutation rate) is estimated to be substantially higher than the genetic mutation rate (Graaf et al. 2015), creating new heritable variation that can ultimately enable adaptation. Finally, for small populations with limited genetic variation, or asexual organisms, epigenetic variation can be a major source of heritable variation that can enable adaptation to new environments. Evolutionary consequences of epigenetic inheritance | Heredity (nature.com) (Rabbit holes, by the way! I've got real work to do, and instead am spending my time reading into evolutionary biology. Of course, it's not a complete side track. I've got to teach human evolution from the time before the Neanderthal/Denisovan split through the end of the recent Ice Age in just a couple of weeks. There - that justifies it!)

It is just sad that Take Two cares so little about the community that they can't even be bothered to talk to us about what happened...but then turn around and make sure nobody else can either.

No one has touched the code in any of the visible branches since the WARN went effective. Provided he can talk about it, he was the lead engineer until shortly after release... so probably most of the work ever done on KSP2 in its single year of life was laid out by him at least in concept. He might not be able to comment on workplace politics, or call Nate a scammer, or whatever... but he might be able to tell us some further details on why KSP2 was such a low aiming mess and why they made such crap technical decisions.

...yourfaceiscringe... But real talk, I should have done that. I just like the aesthetics of the classic F1.

The article I read compared holocaust survivor children with related populations that managed to get out of Europe beforehand. It's googlable and has been expanded on, I think. The other component I did not write above is that the 'hard line' of random selection may have been an anti-religionist / reaction to religious criticism, rather than good science. There is some talk (in the article /related work) about the 'intent / plan / purpose' of the organism that offers fraught language for those leery of the 'intelligent design' folks... But I read it as 'the organism has some agency in its choice of environment or the resources it has available to exploit - and how well that serves the critter's purpose to survive and procreate may have some impact on the genes it passes to the next generation.

Battletech/Mechwarrior is worth it. Unless you choose house Liao, then you're doing it wrong. LONG LIVE THE PRINCE! Real talk, you're not alone. I've just been accepted into my local model railroad club. This has led to my first additions to my collection in, like, 10 or so years. So you guys know why I haven't posted a lot recently. In any case, y'all always deliver.

right now actively talking actively showing right now we got the legendary Foonix. suggestions are being made (kinda due to talking at the same time to foonix).. right now iirc he is doing Performance loading times for large single crafts (nothing public) WorldVis (Visual asset and mod development tool for KSP2 ) and other small talk, HDR, Planet color changing.. (nothing public)

Hello. Why can't I talk in Welcome Aboard, I am new, and it would be weird if new people can't talk in the subforum made for that.

If you have a file host that can host ~10GBs we can talk. I have a personal server I can initiate an FTP transfer from too. But there are some issues with the current site image image I am working through (mostly the fact that some pages get blanked when the server goes down as it often does, I am doing a second pass to re-retrieve those). If you check in with me say a week from now I should have something flawless, and would be happy to share if you can provide the means to receive it.