[1.10.x] Precise Editor 1.4.0.1 [August 31 2020]

[E_Torfbinder]

Great, this work's fine for me.

Thank you (:

[zolotiyeruki]

19 hours ago, Gavin786 said:

@E_Torfbinder

Create the file C:\<your kerbal space program>\GameData\PreciseEditor\PluginData\PreciseEditor.cfg

and default values in PreciseEditor.cfg :

ANCHOR = source
DELTA_POSITION =0.2000
DELTA_ROTATION = 15.0000
REFERENCE_SPACE = absolute
 

PreciseEditor.cfg seems not be included with current CKan release, causing the problem of editor not appearing as it cant load this file.

Good catch--I'll have to fix that as soon as I have a chance.

[linuxgurugamer]

1 minute ago, zolotiyeruki said:

Good catch--I'll have to fix that as soon as I have a chance.

You should create the file if it doesn't exist

[Marxon]

Tried to manually add the config file but P does not open the dialog box.

[jfrouleau]

I confirm that the directory PluginData with the PreciseEditor.cfg file has to be included with the build. Also it looks like PreciseEditor.csproj has some differences from mine. UnityEngine.dll and UnityEngine.UI.dll are missing while UnityEngine.IMGUIModule.dll has been added. You may want to check for that. Also make sure its compiled in release not debug if it's not the case.

[zolotiyeruki]

Yup, it appears that copying the PluginData directory, with PreciseEditor.cfg, corrects the issue.  I've created a new release with the updated zip file.

[Linkageless]

I just want to say a big thank you to @jfrouleau for creating this mod, and to @zolotiyeruki for carrying on the good work!   I find it indispensable for any design that needs precision building or careful tuning.

[Murdabenne]

On 9/8/2020 at 7:09 AM, zolotiyeruki said:

Yup, it appears that copying the PluginData directory, with PreciseEditor.cfg, corrects the issue.  I've created a new release with the updated zip file.

FYI, it has not propagated to CKAN yet. (I'll edit this once it does so you do not need to worry with that)

[zolotiyeruki]

11 hours ago, Murdabenne said:

FYI, it has not propagated to CKAN yet. (I'll edit this once it does so you do not need to worry with that)

Hmmm, my copy of CKAN shows 1.4.0.2 (the one that includes the cfg file).  You might want to refresh the repo.

[Murdabenne]

11 hours ago, zolotiyeruki said:

Hmmm, my copy of CKAN shows 1.4.0.2 (the one that includes the cfg file).  You might want to refresh the repo.

I just refreshed.  It still shows 1.4.0 date 2/20/2020,.  weird

EDIT: OK, I'm running 1.9.1 KSP, and the highest version for that is apparently 1.4.0.  If I force the version to 1.10 in CKAN version setting, I get the mod's 1.4.0.2 available. 

Does the metadata need to be added to fix this for 1.9.1?

Edited September 12, 2020 by Murdabenne
Found the problem.

[jfrouleau]

@Murdabenne : CKAN will list the mod version compatible with your version of KSP. Precise Editor 1.4.0 for KSP 1.9.x was the last one I made while Precise Editor 1.4.0.2 was compiled for KSP 1.10. So if you want the last version you must upgrade to KSP 1.10. But since @zolotiyeruki didn't modify the mod and simply recompiled it you can use Precise Editor 1.4.0 with your KSP 1.9.1 and it will be exactly the same.

[Murdabenne]

14 hours ago, jfrouleau said:

@Murdabenne : CKAN will list the mod version compatible with your version of KSP. Precise Editor 1.4.0 for KSP 1.9.x was the last one I made while Precise Editor 1.4.0.2 was compiled for KSP 1.10. So if you want the last version you must upgrade to KSP 1.10. But since @zolotiyeruki didn't modify the mod and simply recompiled it you can use Precise Editor 1.4.0 with your KSP 1.9.1 and it will be exactly the same.

So that version (dated 2/2020) includes the proper config file, etc?

[zolotiyeruki]

9 hours ago, Murdabenne said:

So that version (dated 2/2020) includes the proper config file, etc?

Yes.  I believe it's only my first release (v1.4.0.1) that omits it.

[flart]

For some reason P-hotkey doesn't work for some small robotics parts, like Stock-DLC G-00 Hinge, or two "LBow" from the Missing Robotics mod

UPD. 

P-hothey doesn't work then a mouse hover over a movable half of a robotic part, and works otherwise.

 

Edited November 5, 2020 by flart

[Aerospacer]

On 6/29/2019 at 10:59 PM, HB Stratos said:

[Feature request]
[ skip . . . ]
Last thing is an exact fairing tweak where we can set exact numbers for the fairing section positions. Should also be affected by 'cheat mode' to allow us to do crazy stuff

And as all the others here say as well, that not is my probably most used mod that I have.

Thanks for taking a look at my requests
-HB Stratos

[EDIT]
Would also be cool if we could set the default rotation and move increments in a cfg file.

@jfrouleau and @zolotiyeruki, Thanks for create and continue of this excellent mod. Just want to ask, is there a chance to make editing fairing in numbers?

This would be a very welcome improvement for many KSP gamers.

[zolotiyeruki]

23 hours ago, Aerospacer said:

@jfrouleau and @zolotiyeruki, Thanks for create and continue of this excellent mod. Just want to ask, is there a chance to make editing fairing in numbers?

This would be a very welcome improvement for many KSP gamers.

To be honest, probably not by me--while I've done a fair bit of programming in my time, the extent of my knowledge for building plugins only goes as far as being able to recompile them against new versions of KSP, and I'm woefully short on spare time to pick up yet another hobby

[Linkageless]

There's something that's really bothering me at present while working on spaceplanes.  I feel it's more a problem with KSP than Precise Editor - it's the precision that's showing KSP up in this case.

I use Precise Editor for almost all my spaceplane builds as I've found it's perfect for getting everything 'just so', and then tweaking by tiny amounts when very subtle changes are needed.  What troubles me is that the mirror symmetry in the SPH just isn't perfect.   Position is sometimes out by one or two points (ten thousandths, ie 0.0001) but the main problem for me seems to be angles, these can sometimes seem to be off by thousandths or even hundredths.

What muddies the waters a little is the way the angles are shown can be rather confusing due to the part orientation; eg a pair of elevons in symmetry may have X angles of 90 and 270 respectively in Absolute mode.  I can accept that is down to the way KSP achieves the symmetry and Precise Editor needn't hide that.  (I'm glad it translates so we don't have to deal directly with the radians or whatever it is there in the craft files!)

An example of the lack of symmetry I've seen is when tweaking the angle of such a pair of elevons up a little, they might have X angles of 89.9031 and 270.0816 respectively.  I follow that increase in one mean a decrease in the other, as it's flipped for the symmetry.  I'll even accept that the 0.1 increment I'd applied doesn't actually result in a 0.1 degree difference in angle, the order of magnitude is good enough for me.   What frustrates me is that the resulting angles in these mirrored parts no longer add up to 360.   We're missing 0.0153 of a degree between them and so they're not equally mirrored now.  Flying the resulting craft would actually give a noticeable roll that I'd be unable to attribute to anything else (with and without KJR, autostruts, rigid attachment, etc).

Again, I appreciate that this is due to the way the angles are represented internally and that there's probably rounding errors responsible for this.  Precise Editor would appear to be simply representing what KSP has modelled.   Sometimes, you can tweak such values with the finest precision and see some interesting effects, like jumping back and forth through an order of magnitude higher as you keep incrementing, and the change may not be represented in the opposite of the mirror pair.

You can even make a difference by setting 0.0001 increment, then hit /10 to take it down to 0.00001 (displayed as 0.0000).  Again, I'm not complaining about that.  In terms of angle that's minute and I don't really have use for it other than to attempt to tweak things to re-align.

 I'm wondering if anyone else has seen this and if there's a way round it.  Perhaps I've been doing it wrong somehow?  It's clear that KSP can't really handle 0.0001 of a degree, but why can't it do 0.1 of a degree identically on a mirror pair?

[zolotiyeruki]

All those issues sound a lot like Floating Point error, and it's a very real (and troublesome!) thing.  I seem to remember that several years ago, someone from the KSP dev team posted on the blog about the issues they face.  Part of the problem is that we expect great precision (on the order of a centimeter, when docking), across enormous distances (Eeloo is something like 100,000,000,000 meters from Kerbol), so you're looking at 13 orders of magnitude.

[Linkageless]

It does seem like it's down to floating point errors.  Seeing them right in front of you makes them all the more frustrating!

I suppose the thrust of my question is, what do people do to mitigate this?  Build in tolerance?  (eg moar dihedral, lots of roll authority) Find a way to balance out the errors so they mostly average out?  (Not so easy on a small, fast aeroplane).  Do people just cope with it in flight? (eg trim, or constant/repeated control input).

Come to think of it, this may be why I've generally shied away from very small spaceplanes.  It seems easier to build a mid or large size one with all those inaccuracies averaged out.  Either that or go very simple, no angle of incidence, no canards, etc.

[Linkageless]

On 9/2/2020 at 9:54 AM, Gavin786 said:

I have learned to work around this problem, but am very aware it does exist.  Often times when I want to manually put an angle, the only way is to zero the angle first(which takes a lot of time, as often multiple inputs of "0" are needed; a "zero" button would be amazing also, which zeroes the rotation in x, y, z).  After it is zeroes, I rotate in the x, y, and z as I need to using the +/- buttons.

So, requests, put a button "apply angle changes" or such, which can be optional, and requires a button to be pressed before manually input angles take effect.  Then they are all normalised together and the rotation done, and any post-normalisation changes to the x, y, z values are then updated.  And another "zero rotation" button would be grand also(but I guess not really needed if the first change is done).

I'll second these two button feature requests.   I'd also request that an 'immediate update' tick box be added, disabling the 'apply angle changes' button.  I'm not sure they'll solve the mirror symmetry issue we've described, but would at very least make working around it easier.

[Sylphio]

Great mod, i will try it for my micro-lander

I am nearly sure that it is not related directly to this mod by did somebody else noticed that the COM is not correct with manned command seat?  I do not look like to apply the kerbal weight at the correct position.

Do somebody know a way to get the real COM/COTor the inflight COM/COT?

[Marxon]

I never thought I'd be stressed out by numbers but even this addon doesn't fix the minute offset values seen here in the part file which I was hoping this addon would remove:
I don't want to have to change these values manually as I have a feeling setting attPos and attPos0 to the same values would break things but, any way to use this addon to force these extra digits to oblivion?

[zolotiyeruki]

Hi All, maintainer here.  Over Christmas, I'm hoping to dig into the source code for this mod and another I maintain, to see if I can make a few tweaks.  Be patient, though--I've never actually *written* any mods, I just recompile them for now, so there'll be a bit of a learning curve...

[alien_wind]

On 12/22/2020 at 3:57 PM, zolotiyeruki said:

Hi All, maintainer here.  Over Christmas, I'm hoping to dig into the source code for this mod and another I maintain, to see if I can make a few tweaks.  Be patient, though--I've never actually *written* any mods, I just recompile them for now, so there'll be a bit of a learning curve...

sounds great much luck with that!
by any chance do you know if the're any plans to integrate precise editor in the new 1.11 eva construction mode?

[zolotiyeruki]

I started poking around, and was able to get a "zero" button in place and working, but the layout is messed up.  I don't know if I'll be able to get it working in EVA construction mode.  As I said before, I'm a complete noob at mods, although I have lots of experience programming.  It only took me about half an hour to sort out the code and figure out how to add the zero button.