Unobserved Flights

[keyscapeunit]

Hi all!

A couple of questions:

1. When you leave a flight and go back to the Space Center, do you get any warnings? For example, if the ship was to start re-entering Kerbin's atmosphere, would you be notified?

2. Is there a way to "program" flights? For example, could you set a series of maneuver nodes and have the ship automatically execute them unattended?

Thank you!

[Tourist]

1. My understanding is that if you are not in control of a vessel, then it is "on rails". It will just keep going around, and around its orbit, even if that obit takes it through an atmosphere. I think its a different story if its orbit actually takes it into the ground.

I'm sure I've left ships, which were I in control, should have been captured by the atmosphere, but because I was in the tracking station, just kept orbiting.

2. There is no way to do this in stock... the Mechjeb mod can automate many maneuvers.... not sure if it works if you are not actively in control though, I've never used it personally. Edited November 18, 2015 by Tourist

[Snark]

1. Nope.

2. Not in stock. There are various mods that have "autopilot" type of functionality. For example, RemoteTech does this-- it's necessary because it adds lightspeed delay when controlling remote probes, so that's the only way to control the ship. However, note that "unattended" here just means "with your hands off the keyboard". It won't do it unless the ship is currently loaded and focused.

If you're looking for a way to control flights that aren't currently the loaded ship-- that won't work, the game doesn't load those ships, they're just running on rails.

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[quote name='Tourist']My understanding is that if you are not in control of a vessel, then it is "on rails". It will just keep going around, and around its orbit, even if that obit takes it through an atmosphere. I think it may be a different story if its orbit actually collides with the ground. I could be wrong about this, I have never experimented with it.[/QUOTE]

The game applies a limit of 1% of Kerbin sea-level pressure (which is around 23 km altitude on Kerbin). A ship "on rails" that's above that altitude will simply behave as if the atmosphere weren't there. A ship "on rails" that's below that altitude on a planet with atmosphere will simply be silently destroyed. For a ship on a vacuum world, the death point is when it intercepts terrain.

[jhousen]

Once you leave a flight it goes "on rails" ie no changes with one exception

If the periapsis is deep enough into the atmosphere, the craft will despawn (it was 14km in beta, not sure what it is now) once it gets to some magic altitude
Warnings there is not
Course changes there is not in this context, even autopilot mods like mechjeb require the vessel they are controlling to be the active vessel

[Red Iron Crown]

[quote name='Snark']2. Not in stock. There are various mods that have "autopilot" type of functionality. For example, RemoteTech does this-- it's necessary because it adds lightspeed delay when controlling remote probes, so that's the only way to control the ship. However, note that "unattended" here just means "with your hands off the keyboard". It won't do it unless the ship is currently loaded and focused.[/QUOTE]
Last time I tried this with MechJeb doing the automating it didn't require the vessel to be focused, only within physics range. So you could conceivably have two or more vessels docking under autopilot simultaneously with a space station, for example.

[Snark]

[quote name='Red Iron Crown']Last time I tried this with MechJeb doing the automating it didn't require the vessel to be focused, only within physics range. So you could conceivably have two or more vessels docking under autopilot simultaneously with a space station, for example.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, but I kinda got the impression that the OP was thinking of this in terms of "set up all my maneuver nodes and go back to KSC and it'll take care of it for me," which clearly can't happen.

[Alshain]

[quote name='Red Iron Crown']Last time I tried this with MechJeb doing the automating it didn't require the vessel to be focused, only within physics range. So you could conceivably have two or more vessels docking under autopilot simultaneously with a space station, for example.[/QUOTE]

Remote Tech's flight computer can be a bit buggy, I don't recommend that.

[ineon]

There is no way of setting the maneuver to fire automatically, but I use [URL="http://www.curse.com/ksp-mods/kerbal/220289-kerbal-alarm-clock"]Kerbal Alarm Clock[/URL] so that I know when any nodes are coming up.

With it you can create a maneuver node, then set an alarm (usually about 1-2 mins before you need to execute it), and then go away and do something else. You will get a reminder that you need to do that maneuver just before you need to do it, and a helpful "Jump to ship" button to take you there.

[Red Iron Crown]

[quote name='Snark']Yeah, but I kinda got the impression that the OP was thinking of this in terms of "set up all my maneuver nodes and go back to KSC and it'll take care of it for me," which clearly can't happen.[/QUOTE]
Agreed, both that that seems to be what the OP is intending and that it won't work.

[MaxwellsDemon]

I recommend Kerbal Alarm Clock. Won't do it for you, but will direct your attention back to it when needed.

[KerbMav]

Kerbal Alarm Clock is the answer, yes.
Even for your first question, as you can set a maneuver node (eyeballing it) before reentry and [I]let yourself be alarmed[/I] too.

[Snark]

[quote name='Alshain']Remote Tech's flight computer can be a bit buggy, I don't recommend that.[/QUOTE]

FWIW, just as another anecdotal data point: I've done a few lenghty career playthroughs with RemoteTech, and my experience with the flight computer has been positive. For one thing, its SAS implementation is rock-solid stable, much better than KSP's stock SAS. It doesn't get the jitters when reaction torque is high, and it doesn't overshoot so much. One notable exception is that it has a bug where it sometimes gets confused when you have multiple command modules oriented in different directions, e.g. a tug pushing a docked ship that's facing retrograde, which can cause it to accelerate rotation rather than damping it. Other than that, though, I've had a good experience with it.

[Pecan]

[quote name='Red Iron Crown']Last time I tried this with MechJeb doing the automating it didn't require the vessel to be focused, only within physics range. So you could conceivably have two or more vessels docking under autopilot simultaneously with a space station, for example.[/QUOTE]

Indeed. In this space-station picture I'd just finished manually docking the tug, on the right. MJ had simultaneously brought in the two landers (to the left) from their launch vehicle and was lining them up to dock either side of the orange tube.

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KOS would be my best bet for the OPs question, but as far as I know the ship still has to stay focussed. Programming it is probably harder than manual flight too. Worth asking on that thread though?

[Alshain]

[quote name='Snark']FWIW, just as another anecdotal data point: I've done a few lenghty career playthroughs with RemoteTech, and my experience with the flight computer has been positive. For one thing, its SAS implementation is rock-solid stable, much better than KSP's stock SAS. It doesn't get the jitters when reaction torque is high, and it doesn't overshoot so much. One notable exception is that it has a bug where it sometimes gets confused when you have multiple command modules oriented in different directions, e.g. a tug pushing a docked ship that's facing retrograde, which can cause it to accelerate rotation rather than damping it. Other than that, though, I've had a good experience with it.[/QUOTE]

Oh, it works when you use it just right. But if something out of the ordinary happens it goes nuts firing your engine and the only way to stop it is shut down the engine, cancel the command (which does nothing), then go back to the space center and return to the craft so the command really goes away. It's very specific that it must be used as intended but gets confused easily. For example, if you forget to stage an engine, and a maneuver times out, it gives you an error. Activating the starts engine suddenly and won't stop. If you execute a node and then delete the node, it starts but forgets to stop, on one occasion I had it do that for no apparent reason at all. Having two craft burn at once sounds like it's just asking for trouble. EDIT: Actually I now even want to take that back, the thing is terrible outright. It can't even hold the maneuver node correctly. Edited November 19, 2015 by Alshain

[Guest]

I'm pretty sure that KSP kills any ships that are below a certain height in the atmosphere.