Ksp made me decide to change to Linux

[Daveroski]

I've been thinking about sticking it to Microcough for some time. They bring out a version which I pay for and a few short years later they force me to buy another version because they remove the support and so do the application developers. A lot of the new stuff will not work on the older versions.

So I went a bit nuts and upgraded the system. New Linux friendly motherboard and a GTX980 graphics card. Installed a new HD and set up Linux Mint.

Setting things up is a bit more complicated than Microfluff because let's face it, big corporations prefer people with money but no brains so they include an idiot mode so the suckers among us will stay faithful. Which I did, since 3.1. Paid for every version like like a trained pet monkey.

No more Microspasm! No More!

I didn't relish having to learn a whole new way of doing things and having to actually use the keyboard's 'other' keys. Old dog, new tricks and all that.

I was trying to install drivers manually until I learned about PPA's.

Thinking of switching?

Google ' <the name of the driver> PPA Linux' If it's a popular driver there is almost certainly going to be an easier way of doing it.

I hate it when people use unexplained acronyms in their posts so PPA stands for Personal Package Archive.

It was wanting to use mods with KSP, like the atmospheres packs and loads of parts and Squad removing Windoze 64 support that made me bite the bullet.

I've got 121 games on steam. Currently 31 of them are Linux compatible. About 25%. Newer games tend to be supporting Linux too.

I've played more on KSP than any other game (ever).

Hmmm 64bit KSP load of memory (16 gigs) fast card. KSP 1.0 Bring it on!

Ok, I'm not daft. I know the Linux version will have problems too. Learning the new stuff is hard because my memory is awful nowadays. (I had to recheck that PPA was the acronym I wanted to use earlier.) But opperatingsystemly speaking, I Feel Free! (this is where other Linux users hit me up with some rep )

Daveroski.

PS if others are thinking of upgrading to freedom even though my knowledge base is low and I'm an idiot (as mentioned) I'll be happy to help however I can.

[InterCity]

Hello, fellow Linux user. May your decision to abandon windoze last forever.

I made that switch 7 years later at college, and I used debian at that time. It was driving me nuts at first, TBH.

But now, with Ubuntu 14.04, I think that not only those tech-savy among us can switch to linux. As one wise man on ubuntuforums said...

Who needs Gates and Windows in a world with no walls...

[Corw]

I've had few failed attempts to switch to Linux before, wasn't really a love on first sight. Tried Ubuntu recently and we clicked on first date. It has became my primary OS. It was always the games that were holding me back on Windows before, and now so many are actually released on Linux and with Steam OS I believe many more will come. If my father (60+) can break into Ubuntu, anyone can

[Fel]

I've been thinking about sticking it to Microcough for some time. They bring out a version which I pay for and a few short years later they force me to buy another version because they remove the support and so do the application developers. A lot of the new stuff will not work on the older versions.

Kernel upgrades aren't forwards compatible, nor should they be; and Linux/Apple will ALSO remove support for old kernels. OS depreciation is a bit different, and usually is just arrogance... the same arrogance you'll find 4 fold with linux as people push library after library at you saying what you have is obsolete and you need to switch to x y or z; of course, this only means you'll have to download configuration tools for each of these because your settings are unique to the library in question, and not global as in OSX or Windows.

So I went a bit nuts and upgraded the system. New Linux friendly motherboard and a GTX980 graphics card. Installed a new HD and set up Linux Mint.

Setting things up is a bit more complicated than Microfluff because let's face it, big corporations prefer people with money but no brains so they include an idiot mode so the suckers among us will stay faithful. Which I did, since 3.1. Paid for every version like like a trained pet monkey.

No more Microspasm! No More!

"linux friendly?" What, just disable secure boot, or use use shim if you really need it. Secure boot being on by default is a feature for the "free virus? how can I say no" public.

Setting up linux is the same as setting up windows; unless you're compiling the kernel with no outside help and setting everything up by hand... its the same old windows installation. Even Arch really overblew how "hard" it was to partition, format, and mount hard drives. Everything else was just "we don't have a gui or a script here to run very simple commands because it makes us feel superior"

I didn't relish having to learn a whole new way of doing things and having to actually use the keyboard's 'other' keys. Old dog, new tricks and all that.

I was trying to install drivers manually until I learned about PPA's.

For the most part, "hey it works" drivers should work out of the box. Most of "windows drivers" are rather pointless, add in a few features you'll never use.

Besides, you should be checking your distro's wiki for help, not using google; they'll usually have a repository specifically setup to help with the proprietary drivers.

Ok, I'm not daft. I know the Linux version will have problems too. Learning the new stuff is hard because my memory is awful nowadays. (I had to recheck that PPA was the acronym I wanted to use earlier.) But opperatingsystemly speaking, I Feel Free! (this is where other Linux users hit me up with some rep )

Linux is just an OS; the linux community is well... yeah. There is a difference between hating something because it doesn't work and hating it because it isn't FOSS.

[cartographer]

You are making the right choice . I have to warn you though that eventually you will become such a power user of linux that you will only run windows in a VM when you need it and strive to get your laptop to cold boot to desktop in under 10 seconds for no reason other than you can (note: I spent more time than I'd like to admit on that, haha). Learning your way around a linux environment is a huge plus when it comes to anyone who wants to go into software development as well. The only words of warning I have for people who want to make the switch is that you might have some issues if you have a laptop with switchable graphics (e.g. one that can either use a discrete card or cpu-integrated graphics), but it shouldn't be terribly hard to figure that out if you install a user-friendly distro like ubuntu.

[soulsource]

I was trying to install drivers manually until I learned about PPA's.

Welcome, fellow Linux user!

If I may make a suggestion:

Do yourself a favour and avoid third party repositories (or, as they are called on Ubuntu: PPAs). They can be a huge pain when upgrading to newer distribution releases. I mean, they are still a lot better than installing software without using proper package management at all, but my experience (I've been using Linux for more than 10 years now) is that whenever possible, one should stick to software available in the official repositories.

Sadly, with your

card you're more or less forced to use proprietary drivers. Nevertheless, there are packages for the proprietary drivers available through the official Linux Mint repositories (if I'm not mistaken the package is called nvidia-current-updates). Also, in the Administration menu, there should be a tool called "Driver Manager" (I'm not certain how it's called nowadays, as I'm not running Mint), which makes driver installation quite easy.

[Daveroski]

I've had few failed attempts to switch to Linux before, wasn't really a love on first sight. Tried Ubuntu recently and we clicked on first date. It has became my primary OS. It was always the games that were holding me back on Windows before, and now so many are actually released on Linux and with Steam OS I believe many more will come. If my father (60+) can break into Ubuntu, anyone can

Thank you for your kind reply (and the rep of course )

I'm an old phahrt too. Brain doesn't fire on all it's thrusters any more. KSP has helped me keep my mind active. As a child I used to play KSP with bits of scrap. Space Stations, landers, and rockets. The space program had really only just got going. When KSP came out, I could apply my childhood dreams with more adult intelect. I am so in my element now

As far as my new OS is concerned, It was a difficult first date. We didn't really know each other and Linux was shy and I didn't know the right questions but we are learning about each-other. I installed it, broke it, installed it again and broke it again. But we never gave up on each other and now we seem to be making some headway at communicating with each-other.

Thanks again.

[Kaa253]

Welcome. Well done. You will no doubt have some rough points on the road into being a full time linux user but I say it is worth it in the end. I installed linux for the first time back when Win 95 was the "norm". I uninstalled windozes at 7. Squad should be most highly commended for supporting the linux gaming community. I also have now played KSP for longer than any other game ever (nearly reached my 2nd birthday of KSP ). A Kubuntu user here but I know that mint is also very good.

[Daveroski]

Welcome, fellow Linux user!

If I may make a suggestion:

Do yourself a favour and avoid third party repositories (or, as they are called on Ubuntu: PPAs). They can be a huge pain when upgrading to newer distribution releases. I mean, they are still a lot better than installing software without using proper package management at all, but my experience (I've been using Linux for more than 10 years now) is that whenever possible, one should stick to software available in the official repositories.

Sadly, with your

card you're more or less forced to use proprietary drivers. Nevertheless, there are packages for the proprietary drivers available through the official Linux Mint repositories (if I'm not mistaken the package is called nvidia-current-updates). Also, in the Administration menu, there should be a tool called "Driver Manager" (I'm not certain how it's called nowadays, as I'm not running Mint), which makes driver installation quite easy.

Indeed. When I first tried Linux on a USB, it didn't even need me to install a graphics driver as it had scanned my old system and used the correct driver by itself. When I used the same USB in my 'new' system, it told a different story. I had to work at it. Still job's done now. Happy bunny.

Daveroski.

[Renegrade]

That's a pretty bold move. I've pretty much decided my retail-license version of 7 will be the last copy of Windows I own (well, aside from the unwanted OEM version that invariably comes with a portable device, which would get uninstalled in any situation anyways as that would be something like 8 anyhow). As soon as Microslop shelves that, it's game over. I've been running hybrid for years - multiboot workstations, linux-only servers (well, linux, openbsd or bsdi).

One by one, my various productivity applications have been ported to Linux, leaving only games as Windows' sole selling port, and Microslop is doing everything they can to discourage Windows Gaming in favor of the x-bone it seems. And as others have pointed out, many non-console games are going multiplatform anyhow.

Kernel upgrades aren't forwards compatible, nor should they be; and Linux/Apple will ALSO remove support for old kernels.

Here's the difference though: you don't have to pay for a new version of Linux. Upgrades are motivated by features or performance rather than "it's time for OS 2015! $$chaching$$!" Heck, most of the Windows advancements (the actual advancements, not garbage like Aero or Metro) could have been compiled for and installed on Windows NT 3.1/3.5/4/2K/XP; they're simply held for the current and latest Windows as a profit-oriented move (stuff like NTFS 3.1, 4k sector support, DX9/10 support, etc). Which reminds me of that old project that ported DX10 to XP...

Also most libraries don't have settings at all. What the heck are you talking about?

As for partitioning on the command line - while fdisk is obtuse as all get out, cfdisk or that partition creator that the Debian installer uses (parted? something like that) is relatively friendly... assuming you don't think filenames are some sort of password (like my old man did..). *cough* Anyhow, CLI or curses-based partitioning has a massive advantage over GUI type ones: you could pretty much build 'em over the real-mode PC-BIOS's calls. No need for three hundred megabyte video drivers.

[Red Iron Crown]

This thread isn't really about KSP, it's about switching to Linux. Moving it over to the Space Lounge.

[Daveroski]

This thread isn't really about KSP, it's about switching to Linux. Moving it over to the Space Lounge.

Sorry, I just thought that as KSP was the reason I made a huge change in my life was actually relevant KSP discussion. .You will notice that in the only reply I have made so far, I referred to KSP again, but you are, as they say, the boss

[Kaa253]

Sorry, I just thought that as KSP was the reason I made a huge change in my life was actually relevant KSP discussion.

I agree. It is actually a KSP discussion. The KSP forum's Space Lounge is however just as good a place for it so; no matter.

[Nibb31]

I've tried switching to Linux several times, but each time, after a few days, I find myself needing that special program that I had on my Windows drive that didn't have an equivalent on Linux. After struggling for 3 days to get Sketchup working in Wine, I gave up and switched back to Windows.

[Nuke]

i run linux on my 'lab' computers since most of my electronics cad programs work on linux. as does the arduino ide, and i love gcc for general programming. i also run linux on all arm based devices i use. i do not like any of the mainstream portable oses and would rather just jump right into linux with those. running 8.1 on my newest machine. i want to do a full switch at some point though. windows keeps getting worse and linux keeps getting better. but there are a number of things i need to figure out or wait for:

i use a lot of stand alone lua on windows and i need to figure out how to set up the environment on linux (i just use lua for windows right now, which takes care of everything for me). i know its possible but its probably a tedious task of hunting down the right lua modules (the 5 or 6 that i use regularly, like luagl, iup, luacom, luasocket, etc) and the right version of the interpreter.

i absolutely must have photoshop and 3dsmax. if these work with wine its probably good enough. no level of performance can rush art. lesser softwares like winamp and notepad++ would probibly run in wine quite well (im not as die hard about these and could probably adapt to linux equivalents).

the real hold up are games. ksp works out of the box, but there are several others i play are windows only. wine might work but at what cost in performance? i also want my trackir to work (though i think linux has support now), and unless the game had a linux version i doubt it would work. there is also my ch control manager software which most likely would not work on linux at all (though im getting fed up with its limitations). these things are probably the only thing out of my control.

need to establish backup and restore procedures. my current doctrine places data on an entirely different drive or partition from the os. if windows fails or does something i dont like, i nuke it, re install and my data sits unknowingly in its own universe safe from destruction. i know linux lets you put your home folder anywhere, ive seen that option in the installer. its probibly that straight forward. i usually also run a number of scripts after a fresh instal to set the system up the way i want it, and that is probably a lot easier to do on linux.

most of this just takes a little hacking on the console to figure out, others i need to wait for support, find an alternative, or do without. the current mix of linux and windows boxes is good enough for now. i might consider a dual boot in the future next time i need to give windows the club, but i also would like to get some more storage first in order to keep the linux stuff isolated to its own drive (you can never have too many ssds).

Edited April 19, 2015 by Nuke

[Stone Blue]

Daveroski, Thanx for a timely thread...

I just decided a couple days ago to try Linux again, JUST for playing KSP. I already have a very streamlined Win 7 dual-boot install on a Win 8.1 laptop, that is ONLY for playing KSP. Its been working well for playing heavily modded KSP, but I've decided I want to be even greedier, and try to stuff even MOAR mods. (I already use 65-100 mods in the Win7 install).

Hence, the attempt at Linux. I dabbled in Ubuntu for a few months, a couple years ago, but never got around to re-installing it when I wiped my computer due to requiring a fresh install of Win 8.1. Other than that, I have NO Linux experience.

It seems so far, the discussion here has been Linux vs Windows, with some basic comments on which distro of Linux some people are using.

I would like my question to focus a little more specifically on which distros people are using and why.

I'm looking for a distro that needs to meet only a few requirements:

First, intuitive GUI, that makes it easy for a 1st time Linux user to switch from Windows.

Second, low memory usage, to maximize KSP gameplay (KSP is the MAIN thing I will be doing)

Third, don't need ANY apps, besides those required to:

1) Play KSP

2) Surf the web (Firefox), for surfing the KSP forum and shopping for mod updates

3) Open PDFs and LibreOffice documents, for opening KSP reference materials I have, while playing KSP

4) An easy to use file manager, for organizing my 3-4 KSP install folders, and the 300+ KSP mods I have

So you can see, the ONLY thing the Linux install will be for, is playing KSP!

I have an i5-2450, 6GB RAM laptop, unfortunately with BOTH Intel HD graphics and an nVidia GT630M GPU.

I've been considering Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Lubuntu, and Mint...Also, it seems there are versions of each of those, that use different desktops? ie MATE, GNOME, KDE, Unity?... even MOAR confusion for a Linux noob...

So, based on my basic requirements, what say you all?

Thanx!

Edited April 19, 2015 by Stone Blue

[LordFerret]

...

i use a lot of stand alone lua on windows and i need to figure out how to set up the environment on linux (i just use lua for windows right now, which takes care of everything for me). i know its possible but its probably a tedious task of hunting down the right lua modules (the 5 or 6 that i use regularly, like luagl, iup, luacom, luasocket, etc) and the right version of the interpreter.

...

I've not had time to meddle with Lua (yet), but I recall it being used widely with Celestia and most of the folks in that arena were running Linux. I don't think your task will be that arduous, as Lua is very well documented and supported.

http://www.lua.org/faq.html

[Nuke]

I've not had time to meddle with Lua (yet), but I recall it being used widely with Celestia and most of the folks in that arena were running Linux. I don't think your task will be that arduous, as Lua is very well documented and supported.

http://www.lua.org/faq.html

lua for the most part is intended to be embedded in an application (its in ansi c but works in c++ and has been ported to others). however it is completely possible to run it as a stand alone language. the reference interpreter is extensible with modules. its not hard to instal the interpreter on linux, you just need to use the package manager for that, but finding and setting up all the modules is what is going to be difficult. i will likely have to hunt them down in the package manager or download from repos and likely compile them myself.

mostly what i use lua for is writing little interface applications for talking to arduinos and the like (for example this one for capturing and displaying data from an imu), even have started a game engine that i work on from time to time. success means being able to run those apps in linux with little or no modification.

Edited April 19, 2015 by Nuke

[LordFerret]

lua for the most part is intended to be embedded in an application (its in ansi c but works in c++ and has been ported to others). however it is completely possible to run it as a stand alone language. the reference interpreter is extensible with modules. its not hard to instal the interpreter on linux, you just need to use the package manager for that, but finding and setting up all the modules is what is going to be difficult. i will likely have to hunt them down in the package manager or download from repos and likely compile them myself.

mostly what i use lua for is writing little interface applications for talking to arduinos and the like (for example this one for capturing and displaying data from an imu), even have started a game engine that i work on from time to time. success means being able to run those apps in linux with little or no modification.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something? Which packages do you need to hunt down? The ones needed to build (compile) Lua? The Lua tarball should have all you need, I would think. Compile it with gcc (or whatever)... the compiler will complain if something's missing.

I wasn't familiar with Arduino. The modern day replacement for Heathkit? Nice job on the interface. You're using Lua to write device drivers with? I'm outta the loop here, I used to use ASM/MASM. lol

[Aghanim]

Daveroski, Thanx for a timely thread...

I just decided a couple days ago to try Linux again, JUST for playing KSP. I already have a very streamlined Win 7 dual-boot install on a Win 8.1 laptop, that is ONLY for playing KSP. Its been working well for playing heavily modded KSP, but I've decided I want to be even greedier, and try to stuff even MOAR mods. (I already use 65-100 mods in the Win7 install).

Hence, the attempt at Linux. I dabbled in Ubuntu for a few months, a couple years ago, but never got around to re-installing it when I wiped my computer due to requiring a fresh install of Win 8.1. Other than that, I have NO Linux experience.

It seems so far, the discussion here has been Linux vs Windows, with some basic comments on which distro of Linux some people are using.

I would like my question to focus a little more specifically on which distros people are using and why.

I'm looking for a distro that needs to meet only a few requirements:

First, intuitive GUI, that makes it easy for a 1st time Linux user to switch from Windows.

Second, low memory usage, to maximize KSP gameplay (KSP is the MAIN thing I will be doing)

Third, don't need ANY apps, besides those required to:

1) Play KSP

2) Surf the web (Firefox), for surfing the KSP forum and shopping for mod updates

3) Open PDFs and LibreOffice documents, for opening KSP reference materials I have, while playing KSP

4) An easy to use file manager, for organizing my 3-4 KSP install folders, and the 300+ KSP mods I have

So you can see, the ONLY thing the Linux install will be for, is playing KSP!

I have an i5-2450, 6GB RAM laptop, unfortunately with BOTH Intel HD graphics and an nVidia GT630M GPU.

I've been considering Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Lubuntu, and Mint...Also, it seems there are versions of each of those, that use different desktops? ie MATE, GNOME, KDE, Unity?... even MOAR confusion for a Linux noob...

So, based on my basic requirements, what say you all?

Thanx!

Lubuntu with proprietary Nvidia driver, libreoffice, and libnotify-bin installed. Its the only OS in my old PC and my Asus K45VM laptop, dual boot with windows 7 in gaming PC. It cover 99.9% of my use case as my daily games (Dota 2, KSP, Gmod) is linux native and I don't have any windows specific software. The only reason that it is dual boot in the gaming PC is that its not just me that use that PC, my brother also use it and that gaming PC is actually my mom unused work PC

What makes me really love linux is that insane amount of logging can make me troubleshoot stuff better compared to windows, as dmesg is better than event viewer to quickly check what happens inside the kernel. Then everything is scriptable in linux, I've wrote a small script in python that detects match found in dota 2 by listening to the notification by dbus and use xdotool to select its window and automatically click the accept button. In windows its harder to make small scripts like that, and I'm not even talking about shell scripts...

And native tabbed file manager. Seriously. Microsoft already know its one of the most frequently asked feature and in Windows 10 it isn't tabbed yet

[Firwen]

Ok, I'm not daft. I know the Linux version will have problems too. Learning the new stuff is hard because my memory is awful nowadays. (I had to recheck that PPA was the acronym I wanted to use earlier.) But opperatingsystemly speaking, I Feel Free! (this is where other Linux users hit me up with some rep )

And you are right.

Using Linux is the first thing to do for anyone who wish to really understand computer sciences.

When you really start to be used to Linux/UNIX environments, you simply can not use something else:

- Linux allows you to control / understand anything in your environment: everything can be logged, removed/added, modded, modified as you want. You can know what your system do, how, why.

- Linux has a development ecosystem far more rich and friendly than Windows, almost any language compiler, popular librayr or scientific software exist under linux.

- Linux is free, you can really TRUST your desktop and stop to worry about one of your app potentially infected/vulnerable/full-of-spyware.

- Linux offers you a SHELL, and when you have understood how powerful it is, you simply can not live without it.

[Kaa253]

Daveroski, Thanx for a timely thread...

...

First, intuitive GUI, that makes it easy for a 1st time Linux user to switch from Windows.

...

4) An easy to use file manager, for organizing my 3-4 KSP install folders, and the 300+ KSP mods I have

So you can see, the ONLY thing the Linux install will be for, is playing KSP!

I have an i5-2450, 6GB RAM laptop, unfortunately with BOTH Intel HD graphics and an nVidia GT630M GPU.

I've been considering Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Lubuntu, and Mint...Also, it seems there are versions of each of those, that use different desktops? ie MATE, GNOME, KDE, Unity?... even MOAR confusion for a Linux noob...

So, based on my basic requirements, what say you all?

Thanx!

I suggest Kubuntu to start with because it has KDE/QT/Dolphin/Plasma (i.e. whatever you want to call it because all that is kind of saying the same thing) which gives you a (relatively) easy, intuitive desktop environment to transition to from Windows. I actually have a full & registered version of MSOffice installed into Wine because I need it to exchange documents exactly and accurately with the other people I work with. I can remote desktop connect to an alternate machine running Windows (in the rare emergency need for windows) but other than that I stay in linux full time. Standard advice is to set up a dual boot which is wise I guess but I found the availability of the reboot to Windows option actually made it more difficult to "kick the habit"

And you are right.

...

- Linux is free, you can really TRUST your desktop and stop to worry about one of your app potentially infected/vulnerable/full-of-spyware.

Absolutely! I spent about 4 hours cleaning viruses and malware and bloatware off my wife's Windows laptop on the weekend. It is so so good to be free of all that in linux.

Edited April 20, 2015 by Kaa253

[Nuke]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something? Which packages do you need to hunt down? The ones needed to build (compile) Lua? The Lua tarball should have all you need, I would think. Compile it with gcc (or whatever)... the compiler will complain if something's missing.

I wasn't familiar with Arduino. The modern day replacement for Heathkit? Nice job on the interface. You're using Lua to write device drivers with? I'm outta the loop here, I used to use ASM/MASM. lol

modules are usually 3rd party and not included with the interpreter. some might be attainable through the package manager, though i might have to go about setting some of them up the old fashoned way. it should just take some sudo fu and a lot of googling.

not really writing drivers. you can usually talk to an arduino over a com port, serialize whatever structure you want to communicate and decode at the other end. the imu app is kind of just using plaintext (easier than decoding binary structures which requires another module). arduino side is just formatting the data as strings and sending it over the com port. i the luacom luars232 module to access serial ports on windows, though i think on linux you can just open a serial port like it was a file. once ive recieved the data it just takes some parsing code to extract the data and determine its type, then it can be graphed out. on arduous with ethernet/wifi (or raspbery pi) you can also use lua scoket for tcp/udp.

some of the things i managed to pull off in lua are pretty impressive. for example i figured out how to implement freetrack support, talk to joysticks (i can also feed vjoy too from lua), of course opengl support comes in handy too. you can usually use a module called alien, which lets me interface with dlls (so on linux). its kind of pretty cool. i just need to figure out how to do these kinds of things on linux, and its probibly a lot easier than i think it is.

e:

decided to try to get some of my lua apps to run on linux. i started with a stupid little vector math calculator i wrote to test my vector libs for nukesim, it just uses iup for the gui stuff. couldnt find the module in the package manager, so i went to sourceforge grabbed the tarball and followed the directions. after that i ran the script in the console and it just sort of worked. one down.

next i wanted to instal luagl, because everything that uses graphics needs that. found the instructions and they said you could use luarocks to install it. i had not used luarocks before, since lua for windows (which actually includes luarocks) has pretty much comes with every useful module you could use. after finding luarocks in the package manager and installing it, a simple 'sudo luarocks install luagl' was all i needed. i started going down my list of dependencies and installing them. i resolved most of them, alien wasnt installing though (i think its dependant on something else). il hack on the terminal more and see if i cant get my game engine to fire up.

Edited April 21, 2015 by Nuke

[Daveroski]

Hmmm I have a problem... KSP loads up fine. I go to the VAB but the ALT key which should copy an item when I click on it, doesn't seem to be doing it. Did I break something?

[LordFerret]

modules are usually 3rd party and not included with the interpreter. some might be attainable through the package manager, though i might have to go about setting some of them up the old fashoned way. it should just take some sudo fu and a lot of googling.

not really writing drivers. you can usually talk to an arduino over a com port, serialize whatever structure you want to communicate and decode at the other end. the imu app is kind of just using plaintext (easier than decoding binary structures which requires another module). arduino side is just formatting the data as strings and sending it over the com port. i the luacom luars232 module to access serial ports on windows, though i think on linux you can just open a serial port like it was a file. once ive recieved the data it just takes some parsing code to extract the data and determine its type, then it can be graphed out. on arduous with ethernet/wifi (or raspbery pi) you can also use lua scoket for tcp/udp.

some of the things i managed to pull off in lua are pretty impressive. for example i figured out how to implement freetrack support, talk to joysticks (i can also feed vjoy too from lua), of course opengl support comes in handy too. you can usually use a module called alien, which lets me interface with dlls (so on linux). its kind of pretty cool. i just need to figure out how to do these kinds of things on linux, and its probibly a lot easier than i think it is.

e:

decided to try to get some of my lua apps to run on linux. i started with a stupid little vector math calculator i wrote to test my vector libs for nukesim, it just uses iup for the gui stuff. couldnt find the module in the package manager, so i went to sourceforge grabbed the tarball and followed the directions. after that i ran the script in the console and it just sort of worked. one down.

next i wanted to instal luagl, because everything that uses graphics needs that. found the instructions and they said you could use luarocks to install it. i had not used luarocks before, since lua for windows (which actually includes luarocks) has pretty much comes with every useful module you could use. after finding luarocks in the package manager and installing it, a simple 'sudo luarocks install luagl' was all i needed. i started going down my list of dependencies and installing them. i resolved most of them, alien wasnt installing though (i think its dependant on something else). il hack on the terminal more and see if i cant get my game engine to fire up.

Heard of Alien, never used it. Curious, I took a look. Seems it no longer has a maintainer, potentially not good news. According to Debian (which I use mostly), it requires Perl (among a few other things), and it wants to run as root. Depends as per current stable (Wheezy).

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Hmmm I have a problem... KSP loads up fine. I go to the VAB but the ALT key which should copy an item when I click on it, doesn't seem to be doing it. Did I break something?

I doubt you 'broke' anything. You're holding down the Alt key and left-clicking on the part/assembly? If so, it should immediately show a ghosted duplicate.