A few "low-hanging fruit" suggestions

[Wyzard]

Now that 1.1 has been released and the major changes are hopefully mostly completed, I thought I'd suggest a few simple usability improvements that could probably be implemented pretty quickly and easily.  The scope of these is small enough that they can probably be part of a "patch" update, rather than having to wait for 1.2.

Add missing on/off actions for action groups

In the action group editor, many parts have "on" and "off" actions (e.g. "Activate Engine" and "Shutdown Engine"), as well as a "toggle" action that turns the part either on or off depending on what it was before.  But some things — I've noticed air intakes, antennas, RCS thrusters, RAPIER combustion mode, and crew modules' window lights — only have the toggle action.  It would be helpful if these had the stateless on/off actions as well.

An example use-case:  I currently have my SSTOs' action groups set up using toggles:  one key to toggle jets and intakes, one to toggle rockets, and one to toggle RAPIER mode if applicable.  I'd like to change them to be based on phases of flight instead:  phase 1 is jets only (for lower atmosphere), phase 2 is jets + rockets (for middle atmosphere), and phase 3 is rockets only (for upper atmosphere and space).  To make that work, I'd need to use entirely stateless actions, such as "Open Intake" in phases 1 and 2 and "Close Intake" in phase 3, so that the results are the same regardless of whether the intakes were already open.  Without the stateless actions, it's impossible to set up action groups in this way.

Add "Jettison Contents" buttons for fuel and oxidizer, like the one for ore

Ore tanks have a button to dump the tank's contents.  Fuel tanks don't.  While one usually wouldn't want to jettison one's fuel, it can occasionally be useful — for example, dumping oxidizer to get more dV out of a nuclear engine, or dumping both fuel and oxidizer to get more TWR at the expense of some dV.  There should probably be a confirmation prompt on this in case someone clicks it by mistake, but it'd be nice to have the ability.

Add a "Close" button to the "Review Stored Data" window

When I click "Review Stored Data" on a part that contains science results, I get a window that shows details for each stored result.  As far as I can tell, the only way to close that window is to click the "Keep", "Transmit", or "Discard" button on each individual result, which can take awhile if there are lots of them.  I have an orbiting science lab that holds 47 science results, and to keep the lab well-stocked with research data, I have to periodically click through them all again to pick out one or two more to research.  It'd be useful to have a button in the corner to close the window immediately, as if I'd clicked "Keep" on all the remaining results.

Grant kerbals experience for landing on a planet rather than planting a flag there

Once I've landed on a planet and gotten a kerbal out of the spacecraft, planting a flag doesn't pose any additional challenge, and it's easy to forget to do.  On more than one occasion, I've brought a kerbal back home after a trip to somewhere distant, only to realize that he didn't get any experience for the landing because I forgot to plant a flag.  And when I'm landing somewhere routinely — say, the Mun — I don't want to leave flags for every kerbal who's ever set foot there, so I usually plant a flag, type some dummy text, and then immediately take it down.  This is a hassle; it'd be more convenient, and would make more sense in terms of realism, if the experience were tied to simply landing on the planet (or maybe doing an EVA on the surface).

Edited April 21, 2016 by Wyzard
Added "suggestion" tag

[Alshain]

Add a deploy limiter to the service bays doors.

Add Staging on/off to fairings.

[Enceos]

5 hours ago, Wyzard said:

Grant kerbals experience for landing on a planet rather than planting a flag there

Once I've landed on a planet and gotten a kerbal out of the spacecraft, planting a flag doesn't pose any additional challenge, and it's easy to forget to do.  On more than one occasion, I've brought a kerbal back home after a trip to somewhere distant, only to realize that he didn't get any experience for the landing because I forgot to plant a flag.  And when I'm landing somewhere routinely — say, the Mun — I don't want to leave flags for every kerbal who's ever set foot there, so I usually plant a flag, type some dummy text, and then immediately take it down.  This is a hassle; it'd be more convenient, and would make more sense in terms of realism, if the experience were tied to simply landing on the planet (or maybe doing an EVA on the surface).

Kerbals get experience on landing. Flag planting boosts exp by 1 point on planets outside Kerbin SOI. You can get the Portrait Stats mod to see the current flight experience.

Edited April 21, 2016 by Enceos

[Enceos]

@Wyzard You can add a line with 

MODULE
{
    name = ModuleFuelJettison
}

To the .cfg file of all the fuel tanks where you want the fuel dump option.

Or you can use this patch, if you have ModuleManager:

Spoiler

@PART[*]:HAS[@RESOURCE[LiquidFuel]]:FINAL

{

    MODULE
    {
        name = ModuleFuelJettison
    }

}

Squad will not bother with things we can tweak ourselves.

Edited April 21, 2016 by Enceos

[Pthigrivi]

^ I dont know thats a lot of fuel tanks to go through. I don't think its crazy to give us a button.

A couple more off the top of my head:

- Shielded docking port should have another attatchement node in the VAB when open.

- The M1 wheels should be able to deflate and fold up for better packing.

[Alshain]

6 hours ago, Enceos said:

Squad will not bother with things we can tweak ourselves.

That is the most nonsense thing I have ever heard.  You are saying Squad would rather leave their stock game inferior than add something that has no downside just because we can tweak it ourselves?  The deploy limiter on the service bay doors for example.  I have a script that adds it, but it should be stock.  There literally is no downside to having it stock.

You do realize half this game now was a mod at some point, right?  Why would they have done that if we can tweak it ourselves?

[Enceos]

Just now, Alshain said:

That is the most nonsense thing I have ever heard.  You are saying Squad would rather leave their stock game inferior than add something that has no downside just because we can tweak it ourselves?  The deploy limiter on the service bay doors for example.  I have a script that adds it, but it should be stock.  There literally is no downside to having it stock.

You do realize half this game now was a mod at some point, right?  Why would they have done that if we can tweak it ourselves?

Everyone can declare "this should be stock" "that should be stock", but it's still a personal opinion. Squad mostly tweaks things without which the game is broken. Main focus is new things and bugfixes.

[Alshain]

55 minutes ago, Pthigrivi said:

- Shielded docking port should have another attatchement node in the VAB when open.

That isn't as 'low hanging' as you might think.  There is no construct in the game for a disappearing attachment node.

Just now, Enceos said:

Everyone can declare "this should be stock" "that should be stock", but it's still a personal opinion. Squad mostly tweaks things without which the game is broken. Main focus is new things and bugfixes.

False.  Completely utterly, 100% false.

[Enceos]

Just now, Alshain said:

That isn't as 'low hanging' as you might think.  There is no construct in the game for a disappearing attachment node.

In stock yea, only mods have this feature.

[Alshain]

Just now, Enceos said:

In stock yea, only mods have this feature.

Are there mods add disappearing nodes?  I'm kinda curious to see that.

[adsii1970]

I still think an orbital counter that could be toggled. Especially with some of the capsules or probe cores... Once you select a target, then it begins counting orbits...

[Enceos]

@Alshain I say your B.U.L.B. mod should be stock are you planning to revive it in the light of 1.1 ?

[Alshain]

Just now, Enceos said:

@Alshain I say your B.U.L.B. mod should be stock are you planning to revive it in the light of 1.1 ?

Yeah, I just got my computer fixed, but yeah I had planned on updating it soon.  As for stock, that one may or may not be completely harmless in stock.  Depends on their vision of the game, I would say the same for the Jettison fuel suggestion, Squad may not want to do that (or they might, who knows).  I wouldn't care if they did add it to stock though.

[rcp27]

I certainly don't like the whole plant flag thing. I mean Niel Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin both get the same credit IMO for their flag planting even though only one flag actually got shoved in the ground. I'd go for a "any Kerbal on EVA and landed within 20 meters gets credit" solution. By all means make them all actually get out of the lander and watch, but only one flag should need to be stuck in the dirt.

[Alshain]

1 minute ago, rcp27 said:

I certainly don't like the whole plant flag thing. I mean Niel Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin both get the same credit IMO for their flag planting even though only one flag actually got shoved in the ground. I'd go for a "any Kerbal on EVA and landed within 20 meters gets credit" solution. By all means make them all actually get out of the lander and watch, but only one flag should need to be stuck in the dirt.

Well, to be fair, it took both of them to put the flag in the ground in that case.  But I agree, having every single Kerbal on your mission get out and plant another flag is a bit overkill.

[Enceos]

34 minutes ago, Alshain said:

False.  Completely utterly, 100% false.

Well, more info please, with examples. Things only started changing when RoverDude and NathanKell joined the team.

Edited April 21, 2016 by Enceos

[Pthigrivi]

14 minutes ago, Alshain said:

That isn't as 'low hanging' as you might think.  There is no construct in the game for a disappearing attachment node.

Well they could just leave the node there all the time and let us clip if we wish. Im fine with that too.

[Enceos]

6 minutes ago, Pthigrivi said:

Well they could just leave the node there all the time and let us clip if we wish. Im fine with that too.

I can give you a config line to add that node.

[Pthigrivi]

14 minutes ago, Enceos said:

I can give you a config line to add that node.

That be awesome! Im just starting my cfg list for 1.1

[Enceos]

2 hours ago, Pthigrivi said:

That be awesome! Im just starting my cfg list for 1.1

Well, here's the node position:

    node_stack_top = 0.0, 0.3, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1

The only problem is that the animated docking module doesn't let you decouple that node. You'll have to resort to a stack separator to reliably build ontop of that node.

Edited April 21, 2016 by Enceos

[Pthigrivi]

Hmmm... tricky. I could deal with that though. It doesn't come up a lot, but there are times when trying to do things like stage recovery and packing planes to go to other planets that it would come in really handy.

[Shadowmage]

3 hours ago, Alshain said:

Are there mods add disappearing nodes?  I'm kinda curious to see that.

See SSTU in my signature;  I have a module that can toggle attach nodes on and off in the editor (SSTUSelectableNode).

[Alshain]

4 minutes ago, Shadowmage said:

See SSTU in my signature;  I have a module that can toggle attach nodes on and off in the editor (SSTUSelectableNode).

Well that is certainly neat.  Something that Squad should definitely consider doing, not just for the parts it has but for mods as well.  I still wouldn't call it low hanging fruit, but whatever

[Shadowmage]

Just now, Alshain said:

Well that is certainly neat.  Something that Squad should definitely consider doing, not just for the parts it has but for mods as well.  I still wouldn't call it low hanging fruit, but whatever

To be fair..... its a giant hack that -just- manages to work without breaking things and imploding the universe.  Could certainly be done a lot cleaner if the feature was supported in stock.

Yah, not really 'low hanging fruit'...

[Pthigrivi]

Step ladder accessible fruit.