[1.4.2] Kerbal Space Transport System

[LuciferNZ]

I can confirm what mostlikely has researched.  Cant undock vessels after a save =(

Looking at the .sfs files, and also used the KML editor confirms it - uids of 0 (And thus a big mess of dockUIDs also of 0) break undocking completely =(

[mostlikely]

I found another small bug. When selecting the reference vessel for a complex orbit only vessels are shown that have an orbit below the mission orbit + 600,000m. (The SMA of the vessels are compared to the orbit of the mission.)

I've created github issues for this one and the uid problem.

[p4di]

22 hours ago, mostlikely said:

I then ran 3 quick tests by modifying the persistence before docking:

1. Fill all the uid of the KSTS parts with an unique number from 1 and up: Undocking worked as normal
2. Fill the uid of the dockingports: Undocking did not work.
3. Fill the uid of the dockingports and the root part of the vessels: Undocking worked as normal.

This makes sense as the core docking functionality looks for a way to identify both dockingport and root part of the vessel.

Thanks for your research! Prior to this I haven't really doctored with the persistence file, but those fixes should be pretty trivial to do by myself until it gets fixed with a future update.

On a Sidenote: thanks to mm for this great mod, I really enjoy using it, since I've been using SSTO-rockets for a long time now and the process of launching and then nailing the landing at KSC is quite time consuming.

[-MM-]

On 2.11.2016 at 10:26 PM, LuciferNZ said:

(...) All -MM- needs to do, is update the LastAtHome variable above when a kerbal is launched into orbit, if its exposed.

I will check for the next release, if it is possible to update the "LastAtHome" value in the USI-LifeSupport Scenario. No promises though that it will work.

23 hours ago, mostlikely said:

I did some basic tests with 2 vessels launched manually vs 2 vessels launched with KSTS. As p4di pointed out the KSTS vessels are unable to undock after you save/load or go to the KSC. 

Looking in the persistence files:

1. all the parts of the KSTS vessels have "uid = 0" whereas manually launched vessel parts all have unique numbers.
2. When docked the dockUId of the docking port and rootUId of DOCKEDVESSEL module are 0 for the KSTS vessels while manually launched vessels have proper values.

I then ran 3 quick tests by modifying the persistence before docking:

1. Fill all the uid of the KSTS parts with an unique number from 1 and up: Undocking worked as normal
2. Fill the uid of the dockingports: Undocking did not work.
3. Fill the uid of the dockingports and the root part of the vessels: Undocking worked as normal.

This makes sense as the core docking functionality looks for a way to identify both dockingport and root part of the vessel.

 

If possible KSTS should assign proper uid's to all parts of the vessels it spawns. These ID's probably do not need to be assigned by the base functionality of KSP but they ideally should be unique uid's in the current game. 

Thank you for this report, I will take a look at this for the next release. It should be fairly easy to generate IDs for all the newly created parts.

12 hours ago, mostlikely said:

I found another small bug. When selecting the reference vessel for a complex orbit only vessels are shown that have an orbit below the mission orbit + 600,000m. (The SMA of the vessels are compared to the orbit of the mission.)

I've created github issues for this one and the uid problem.

I don't think this is a bug: If you test it, the new vessel should appear next to your selected reference vessel (if it does not, please write again). The misunderstanding here is probably that most orbital parameters use the reference body's center of mass. In your case Kerbin has the radius of 600,000m, which is added to the altitude, which is typically measured from the body's sea-level. If you take a look at for example wikipedia's entry about the semi-major and semi-minor axis, it should become clear why this is done.

It might seem a little bit confusing at first, but then again, its the "complex" orbit editor ;-)

PS: Sorry, I have misread your post. You mean the filter criteria Altitude/SMA for selecting the reference vessel is wrong. I will take a look at this.

Edited November 7, 2016 by -MM-

[Superfluous J]

I'm having a problem with a fairly complex ship launching in a sandbox game on KSP 1.2 using KSTS 1.5 and GravityTurn 1.7.2 only (I'm trying to launch with GravityTurn and record with KSTS).

The ship has a TR-18A decoupler right above the root part, a probe core that is on the launcher. The payload is about 40 tons (39.5ish IIRC) and under a fairing, as is the decoupler and probe core. The fairing is part of the launcher, not the payload.

When I click "record", several decopulers are available but the TR-18A is not. I'm not sure what else to try, so I'm appealing to the thread.

Here is a zip with the craft file, ksp.log, and output_log.txt from a run where I loaded the ship onto the pad and opened up KSTS to see this screen:

 

Edited November 8, 2016 by 5thHorseman

[mostlikely]

8 hours ago, 5thHorseman said:

When I click "record", several decopulers are available but the TR-18A is not. I'm not sure what else to try, so I'm appealing to the thread.

I loaded your craft in my sandbox save and had the same issue. After I disabled the flow of all the tanks on all the parts of the payload section (electric flow on batteries, life support on pods, ect.) the TR-18A was available. The consumption of any of these resources invalidates the section as payload (I'm guessing the live support and not electric charge).

 

Look like you are killing two birds with one stone by deploying an entire mission while recording for KSTS. Personally I use only fuel tanks for my record missions payload as only the tonnage matter in the end. Each has it's merrit it seems, you have less useless fuel tanks in orbit, I have no consumption problems ;). 

Edited November 9, 2016 by mostlikely

[Superfluous J]

17 hours ago, mostlikely said:

I loaded your craft in my sandbox save and had the same issue. After I disabled the flow of all the tanks on all the parts of the payload section (electric flow on batteries, life support on pods, ect.) the TR-18A was available. The consumption of any of these resources invalidates the section as payload (I'm guessing the live support and not electric charge).

Aha! I had life support installed but uninstalled it, but the stuff is still in the craft file. Never occurred to me that that would affect it. Must be because there's a Kerbal in the pod, because the decoupler right above it is a valid thing to deploy from. Thank you!

17 hours ago, mostlikely said:

Look like you are killing two birds with one stone by deploying an entire mission while recording for KSTS. Personally I use only fuel tanks for my record missions payload as only the tonnage matter in the end. Each has it's merrit it seems, you have less useless fuel tanks in orbit, I have no consumption problems ;). 

Yeah I was trying to both do the mission and standardize "40 ton launches" at the same time. Though I think I'll do what you do from now on in sandbox mode, and then copy the mission profile into my save

[g_BonE]

just stumbled across the "cant undock docked craft from orbital stations at kerbin" - gotta admit its pretty annoying. ill delay any further missions like that until the next KSTS version ("soon[tm]"). Thanks for the mod tho! It really became an essential for me. Not having to watch the lifters over and over again is quite a boon.

[-MM-]

Hello, I've just uploaded a new version of KSTS (1.6, see first post), in which I've fixed several issues:

• Parts of newly created vessels will now get unique part-IDs, which should take care  of the undocking-problem.
• The altitude filter for reference vessels should be working correctly now.
• I've implemented a workaround for the "missing kerbal" problem after transporting or recovering a kerbal via a transport mission. I was unable to fix the root-problem though: Apparently KSP is maintaining a list of assigned kerbals and does not expect us to change vessels which are not active (which I can understand but still want to do). When you save a game, KSP will check the status of your kerbals and might log messages like "[ProtoCrewMember Warning]: Crewmember Sierina Kerman found inside a part but status is set as missing. Vessel must have failed to save earlier. Restoring assigned status." or "[ProtoCrewMember Warning]: Crewmember Sierina Kerman found assigned but no vessels reference him. Sierina Kerman set as missing.". This can lead to kerbals getting lost and what I am doing now is making sure that after this happens kerbals assigned to an (inactive) ship will get the status "assigned" again and kerbals which were recovered will get the status "available" instead of "missing" (probably the same as the game's "respawn missing" option). I hope this does not mess with any other mod that tries to modify the crew roster, but for now it fixes the issue of lost personnel. If there is someone who has a better solution, please let me know.
• KSTS is now triggering appropriate Game-Events when it launches or modifies vessels or their crew. This makes it compatible with my old Closed Loop Life Support mod (which I have recently updated and would like to shamelessly plug at this point): Crew member added or recovered to/from inactive vessels and the resulting change in the life support consumption should get simulated correctly thanks to this new system.

I hope you enjoy this new release and thanks again for the error-reports.

[mostlikely]

4 hours ago, -MM- said:

Hello, I've just uploaded a new version of KSTS (1.6, see first post), in which I've fixed several issues.

Thank you for your continued support. 

-Part-ID's look good now and undocking works as expected for newly deployed crafts.

-The altitude filter works properly now too. 

I've only had time for minimal testing but all my new missions are going smoothly so far.

[-MM-]

I've uploaded another small updated (1.7), fixing an issue reported by "TheRhodanist", which caused struts and fuel-lines not getting properly attached on new vessels. Additionally I've also made the highlighting of payloads a little bit prettier.

[saqib126]

This mod seems quite useful but I like using usi life support, is it possible for me to simply have usils installed but use no parts from it on the transport and use a probe core, and that to work? Do you know what would happen if I used this mod with usi for crew transfers, but had no usils modules on the transport, instead just flying it fast enough to the station that the kerbals don`t perish?(due to no life support)

[westamastaflash]

I love this mod. Any way to save the mission profile? I hate having to retype all the orbital parameters for Minmus transfer orbit (this is especially pronounced on planets that are larger than stock as launching direct to the transfer orbit can save lots of DV).

[Superfluous J]

On 11/16/2016 at 0:16 PM, -MM- said:

Parts of newly created vessels will now get unique part-IDs, which should take care  of the undocking-problem.

I just updated to KSP 1.2.1 specifically to get this update

Will this work on new ships launched using old profiles, or do I need to "prove" the launch again?

[mostlikely]

10 hours ago, 5thHorseman said:

I just updated to KSP 1.2.1 specifically to get this update

Will this work on new ships launched using old profiles, or do I need to "prove" the launch again?

Old profiles will work fine, The problem occurred during the deployment.

[Enorats]

Been having some fun with this mod.. decided to see just how low cost I could get launch profiles.

Decided to make a fuel depot that would mine ore, make fuel, and fill up the planetary stockpile with an MKS logistics center. Basically built KSC its own fuel refinery. When my SSTO comes back from a mission, I dock and refill it with fuel from the refinery.. the idea being that since I didn't pay for the fuel, the launch would essentially be "free". Sadly, it didn't work. As soon as the plane "docks" using a KAS winch cable to transfer the fuel.. the KSTS record is ended. Maybe if I spawned the plane empty and fueled it prior to launching.. but I didn't think of that at the time.

So.. I put the refinery on the plane. Launched up into space, released payload, came back down.. landed, then mined the runway (meh, just a few potholes. Not like I ever actually USE that first 100 meters or so anyway, right?). After a month or so the plane was completely refueled, and filled with some ore to boot. KSTS registered it as being worth about 300 more than when I started! Ended the mission, and now have a profile that can launch for 0 funds. Interestingly, the mission only takes from when I launched to when I landed. It doesn't include the month of downtime spent refueling. Every time I launch using this profile I'm going to imagine Jeb coming in ass first and spinning like crazy because the refinery upset the CoM/CoL relationship when empty, saving it several km off the ground, and spending a month on vacation on the Western coastline's beaches while the ship refuels so he can complete the flight back to the runway and top off again there.

Edited December 11, 2016 by Enorats

[-MM-]

6 hours ago, Enorats said:

Been having some fun with this mod.. decided to see just how low cost I could get launch profiles.
(...)

A very clever solution for keeping the cost down ;-)
The time required to complete a mission is actually only the time it took you from the launch until you released your payload. So you can take as much time as you want on your way back and even stop for a "quick" refuel...

[Superfluous J]

I have a pair of requests that are somewhat related:

1. I'd like a button in the VAB that would bring up the list of available delivery ships, so I could see the options for launching what I'm building, and how much more mass I can put on it (or how much I need to take off) to launch it.
2. In the main window (the one that comes up in the Space Center screen) I'd also like to access that list. I can do it now by selecting a ship first, but ... oh never mind I realize now how lazy that sounds. But I still want the first one!

[-MM-]

On 14.12.2016 at 9:32 AM, 5thHorseman said:

I have a pair of requests that are somewhat related:

1. I'd like a button in the VAB that would bring up the list of available delivery ships, so I could see the options for launching what I'm building, and how much more mass I can put on it (or how much I need to take off) to launch it.
2. In the main window (the one that comes up in the Space Center screen) I'd also like to access that list. I can do it now by selecting a ship first, but ... oh never mind I realize now how lazy that sounds. But I still want the first one!

While there is nothing I can recommend for you in the VAB at this moment (except for pen & paper), in the Space-Center Scene you should take a look at the "Record" tab of the KSTS window. In every scene except the flight-scene it will show you all your recorded profiles with the option to rename and delete them.

[Platonicsolid]

Really been enjoying KSTS - makes doing bigger, ambitious things a lot less tedious. I do think I've found a bug, or at least a behavior I don't get.

I've been trying to record the launch of my Minmus ore miner to get a profile for my 120t lifter - good for things I don't want to Konstruction together.

Here it is on the pad, with the cargo selected:

 

And here I am in flight, everything's good:

But when I need to turn on RCS to help get into position to circularize:

 

It would seem that turning on RCS makes the cargo marked as not-cargo, presumably because RCS blocks on it became active. Is that intended behavior? It seems overly harsh.

[renhanxue]

Interesting mod! In the OP it is mentioned that it is not compatible with Modular Fuel Tanks. Is the incompatibility conceptual, or just related to something Modular Fuel Tanks does in a particular way? The reason I'm asking is that I'm using a mod that does a very similar thing (Configurable Containers) and was wondering if anyone had used that together with KSTS.

[-MM-]

On 10.1.2017 at 7:45 PM, Platonicsolid said:

It would seem that turning on RCS makes the cargo marked as not-cargo, presumably because RCS blocks on it became active. Is that intended behavior? It seems overly harsh.

Hello Platonicsolid, RCS are counted as engines during the recording phase, meaning that they should remain switched off. The idea is that your payload is basically dead weight and must not contain any part that your craft needs to attain its orbit.

On 18.1.2017 at 11:20 AM, renhanxue said:

Interesting mod! In the OP it is mentioned that it is not compatible with Modular Fuel Tanks. Is the incompatibility conceptual, or just related to something Modular Fuel Tanks does in a particular way? The reason I'm asking is that I'm using a mod that does a very similar thing (Configurable Containers) and was wondering if anyone had used that together with KSTS.

The incompatibility is not conceptual, but as far as I remember the problem was, that Modular Fuel Tanks uses the pre-launch phase of your flight to set up the actual tank configuration. When the craft is created directly in space, as it is done with KSTS, this gets skipped and the tank will have its default-settings. To fix this fix this the guys & gals from Modular Fuel Tanks would probably have to change their init-behavior to also handle vessels which spawn in space. But this is just a guess however.

[renhanxue]

Well, having tested it I can report that KSTS works perfectly together with Configurable Containers - recorded a mission with a dummy payload, then used the profile to deployed a craft with a regular fuel tank edited to have a little bit less LF/O in favor of a little bit of monopropellant. No problems at all, craft appeared in orbit with everything in the right place.

Thanks for a great mod!

Edited January 24, 2017 by renhanxue

[billybob579]

Really enjoying this mod so far. One thing I'm wondering, though; would it be possible to expand the "Select reference vehicle" feature to add a slider choosing a degrees-offset in the orbit? For example, matching the orbit of a satellite, but deploying 90 degrees ahead in that orbit? This would be extremely useful for setting up constellations of satellites.

[Horstan]

If I want to download this mod, I only get a blanc window and no download starts. Is the link broken?