New patch coming, plus Unity 5 work to begin

[Yakuzi]

Hotfix hopes (not all realistic):

* Unlockable steering and working wheel animations on the new landing gear.

* Another set of gear between small and medium in height; the small gear are too short to be used as a nosewheel in combination with wing-mounted medium gear.

* Control surfaces that match the new small swept wings.

* Finally fix the asymmetric jet thrust thingie. Having to fiddle with order of intake placement is a pointless nuisance.

* Clouds!

This, plus:

* Add slider to drain/refill all tanks simultaneously in the VAB/SPH using the in-game fuel usage logic (so you can evaluate CoM shifts)

* Add "Centre of Aerodynamics" view in VAB/SPH (so you can check which side of your craft will face downwards when in free fall)

* Fix savegame corruption issues

* Fix MK3 cargo bay occlusion issues

* Strengthen MK3 joints

* In unmanned craft, remove the "no ladder" warning in the engineer report

* Add option to allocate crew to external command seats in the VAB/SPH

* Add shell separation option for fairings

The most important thing, however, is that you get aerodynamics/re-entry heat right in the next version (you may want to consider a parallel beta candidate). From a craft design point of view, it is quite frustrating that important systems like aerodynamics are still incomplete/under development after the "1.0" release...

Edited May 13, 2015 by Yakuzi

[Spartwo]

Ooh, lights on the large landing gear.

[Francois424]

For me, Unity5 is the biggest thing. It's even more important than 0.25, 0.90 and 1.0.x

Even if it doesn't allow for bigger craft or better performances, just the extra memory will be fantastic !

It will allow me to run the Outer planets Mods, or the 1/10th RSS with full textures, in ADDITION to my usual mods when they update (EVE, Engineer, RT2, procedural tanks/fuel, and many more).

I've not delved too much in the 1.0.x game because I am a very slow rocket builder in the game and the Aero is (imho) still subject to be 'adjusted' somewhat, and I don't want to have to redesign all my launchers/ssto every month. Still waiting for that "This is the final aero changes" quote to really start redesigning.

Of my wish list since U5 will be a thing? Electric Propellers, LF tanks for rockets (reskinned 1.5/2.5m tanks is enough), EVE and Kerbal Engineer as part of basic engine, maybe with planetshine too. Oh and a stock button to import/choose skyboxes with a brief description of what the format should be).

Obviously extra stock outer planets, if they have time.

[Monthar]

I'd like to see the radiant heat from the Atomic Rocket Motor reduced. I'd also like to see all parts cool down at a reasonable level. Some parts, such as various science experiments, seem to never cool off. Lastly I'd like to see some sort of radiator to help manage heat during flight.

[peachoftree]

I am hoping for some clouds and also some radiators! They will look so cool.

Nertea has an in development radiator pack that seems to be working quite well for me so far.

you can get it here

[smjjames]

Come on guys, clouds are going to take more than a hotfix.

One would be fixing the fuel drain balance problems like this one here: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/121159-Problems-with-craft-fuel-tanks-not-draining-evenly-asparagus-staging-especially

[Alshain]

So for interpretation, did he say work on a hotfix and Unity 5 begins today, or there would be a hotfix today and then work on Unity 5 begins? I'm re-reading it and it could really go either way (this is why I hate twitter).

[smjjames]

So for interpretation, did he say work on a hotfix and Unity 5 begins today, or there would be a hotfix today and then work on Unity 5 begins? I'm re-reading it and it could really go either way (this is why I hate twitter).

Eric S said earlier that they have KSP on unity 5 on some in-house machines, but I don't know if that was just a 'lets see how it goes' test or they actually have done some work on the transition already.

[Alshain]

Eric S said earlier that they have KSP on unity 5 on some in-house machines, but I don't know if that was just a 'lets see how it goes' test or they actually have done some work on the transition already.

I don't understand why you quoted me with that response, I didn't ask if they already had work done on Unity 5.

[smjjames]

I thought, according to Eric S, they had already done some work or some initial work on it. The majority of the work is definetly still ahead.

[basic.syntax]

The tweet is Maxmaps way of saying "vacation week" is over, the visiting crew has flown / is flying from Mexico, back to their homes around the world. KSP work starts again, this week. Mu talked about a few more Aero tweaks (Quote 1) (Quote 2), those are what I expect (at least) in the next "hotfix" patch.

Edit:

When Unity 5 was brought up in the last squadcast (see my sig, text search recommended due to length) Samssonart was the one who had the most to say about it. Just general stuff, nothing exciting. I have a feeling he is the developer who was first to start experimenting with KSP builds on U5.

Edited May 13, 2015 by basic.syntax

[smjjames]

The tweet is Maxmaps way of saying "vacation week" is over, the visiting crew has flown / is flying from Mexico, back to their homes around the world. KSP work starts again, this week. Mu talked about a few more Aero tweaks (Quote 1) (Quote 2), those are what I expect (at least) in the next "hotfix" patch.

Edit:

When Unity 5 was brought up in the last squadcast (see my sig, text search recommended due to length) Samssonart was the one who had the most to say about it. Just general stuff, nothing exciting. I have a feeling he is the developer who was first to start experimenting with KSP builds on U5.

thanks for the transcript!!!!

i tried asking if there was going to be a transcript or summary as I am hard of hearing and someone said no way.

[Alshain]

So, we are not expecting a hotfix today, just sometime soon^TM. That was my confusion.

[theend3r]

There haven't been any devnotes recently and the search function returned nothing relevant so I will ask here: Is Squad actively looking into Unity 5? Also will devnotes come back in some form?

Thanks

[basic.syntax]

thanks for the transcript!!!!

i tried asking if there was going to be a transcript or summary as I am hard of hearing and someone said no way.

You're welcome. It became so long, that I didn't think it would fit in a forum post. Oddly, it has page views so I know people have seen it, but no one has made comments about things they said or didn't say. Folks don't make many comments on blogs, compared to forum posts.

[Terwin]

Please see the following thread:

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/120989-New-patch-coming-plus-Unity-5-work-to-begin

Apparently MaxMaps has indicated that they are starting on Unity 5 on twitter:

Today: Everyone flies back home. Tomorrow: Hotfix and Unity 5 work begins.

 Maxmaps (@Maxmaps)

May 12, 2015

[Thiagobs]

There's a post about Unity 5 on the Suggestions and Development Discussion subforum:

New patch coming, plus Unity 5 work to begin

I don't know about the Devnotes though...

Edit: Ninja'd

[T-Bouw]

Yes, Squad is going to implement Unity 5 into KSP.

There was a post about it yesterday:

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/120989-New-patch-coming-plus-Unity-5-work-to-begin

Work will resume and I have good hopes that the devnotes will resume as well.

Edit: Wow ninjad twice! (I type too slow...)

[RocketPilot573]

What Terwin said, work on Unity 5 should be underway right now, and of course devnotes should be back, but when the devs actually have something to talk about. Maybe next week?

[theend3r]

Thanks for all the answers. I must've been blind

[Slam_Jones]

So, if I understand correctly, Unity 5 will allow folks with multi-core CPUs to use all of the in KSP, right? As it stands with Unity 4, I believe only one core can be used due to how it's put together or whatnot.

If this is the case, then I'm very much looking forward to when it's been implemented

[sal_vager]

Nope, unless Unity has found a way to calculate their physics on more than one core, Unity4x already uses multiple cores but physics is hamstrung.

Also I better merge this with one of the other 5 million Unity5 threads....

[One-Way Films]

I think an option to make fairing shells 2 or 3 big pieces instead of the current way (teeny tiny pieces that go EVERYWHERE *ahem* ) in the editor would be nice but not crucial! I'd love heatshields to have mass so they don't cause your vessel because that'd help sooo much. If it hasn't been fixed already. I haven't checked XD

[Terwin]

So, if I understand correctly, Unity 5 will allow folks with multi-core CPUs to use all of the in KSP, right? As it stands with Unity 4, I believe only one core can be used due to how it's put together or whatnot.

If this is the case, then I'm very much looking forward to when it's been implemented

According to https://unity3d.com/unity/whats-new/unity-5.0 under Physics: 'Better performance on multi-core processors, and especially on mobile'

[marach]

Nope, unless Unity has found a way to calculate their physics on more than one core, Unity4x already uses multiple cores but physics is hamstrung.

Also I better merge this with one of the other 5 million Unity5 threads....

The move up a version of PhysX does indeed allow multithreaded physics. However I expect the first U5 release of KSP to be a straight port with a minimal performance increase till the physics part of KSP is threaded.