Precise slider adjustments

[Majorjim!]

I was fiddling with servo settings and realized how archaic it is to adjust the sliders with the mouse, could we please be able to type in the values we want as well?

[panzer1b]

I second this, its almost impossible to make super precision movements (which isnt a big deal with 2 servos per leg, but is a huge problem when you are trying to sync alot of servos at the same time).

This is just 1 leg (it should be pretty damn obvious what this is going to go into, center of 3 per side), and it has 3 joints in it, and ive yet to get the bottom piece to move perfectly straight along the ground as its very very hard to sync the 3 pieces without being able to add precise numbers to the animation setup thing.

 

I really like this DLC (and its so worth getting if you are evern remotely interested in mechs, helicopters, or even robotic arms), but it would be very nice to have some more advanced options for those of us that want to make some more complex things.  As it stands, not sure if ill ever be able to make the spider from wild wild west as that thing has like 5 joints PER EACH leg and 8 legs (not to mention the fact that id need to make different sequences for different slopes and a head animation).

 

Actually nevermind, i just found out you can click on the bottom right values in the animation editor to force a key to go to a certain value.  very VERY useful feature that until now i wasnt aware existed...

Edited June 2, 2019 by panzer1b

[Azimech]

Agreed, the sliders aren't precise enough.

[panzer1b]

well this is how you do it (for those that are thusfar unaware of it):

click node you want to edit

click on the "value" box (pic above says 0)

type 3, then 0 which will make that value be 30 degrees

finally when you are done hit enter and the node moves.  This works for both value, and for time node is set at.  Its a bit time consuming to make truly good anims with this thing (id love to be able to enlarge the draggy editor so i can actually make minor adjustments without entering numbers more accurately, but at least there are options to the new animations for those that need specific angles.

Now the only thing i need to do is figure out a way to animate a mech's legs as to not fall off, not fail to lift the mech up, and stay within actuator limitations with regards to movement speed limitation (really SQUAD, you had to cap it at 180deg/s, no idea how ill make a mech go over 50m/s...

[Superfluous J]

I've also noticed that you can run your mech craft through an animation and then work on it, then run it back and work on it some more. How you save it is how it'll load. This allowed me to work on my asteroid grabber "inflated" until I liked it, and then collapse it down so it'll fit in a fairing.

[ZeroG]

For slider values you can adjust with the controller this is an OK workaround, but IMO this is a long-standing UI issue. I often adjust engine outputs on-the-fly so I can make precise adjustments with largeish engines (so set the engine thrust limit to something like 1 for fine-tuning), but it's a serious pain if a rocket has multiple engines. I'm sure other players have other sliders where this is annoying. What would really be nice is something like alt+click or right-click on any slider anywhere on the UI to bring up a number input where I can just type a number. Since the slider appears to be a ubiquitous control on the UI, I think that would be a big quality of life improvement.

[Majorjim!]

13 hours ago, ZeroG said:

For slider values you can adjust with the controller this is an OK workaround, but IMO this is a long-standing UI issue. I often adjust engine outputs on-the-fly so I can make precise adjustments with largeish engines (so set the engine thrust limit to something like 1 for fine-tuning), but it's a serious pain if a rocket has multiple engines. I'm sure other players have other sliders where this is annoying. What would really be nice is something like alt+click or right-click on any slider anywhere on the UI to bring up a number input where I can just type a number. Since the slider appears to be a ubiquitous control on the UI, I think that would be a big quality of life improvement.

This! Being able to type in an exact number would be very helpful! And also the ability to do this for multiple parts would also save a lot of time. 

[BadOaks]

On 6/15/2019 at 2:08 PM, ZeroG said:

For slider values you can adjust with the controller this is an OK workaround, but IMO this is a long-standing UI issue. I often adjust engine outputs on-the-fly so I can make precise adjustments with largeish engines (so set the engine thrust limit to something like 1 for fine-tuning), but it's a serious pain if a rocket has multiple engines. I'm sure other players have other sliders where this is annoying. What would really be nice is something like alt+click or right-click on any slider anywhere on the UI to bring up a number input where I can just type a number. Since the slider appears to be a ubiquitous control on the UI, I think that would be a big quality of life improvement.

I've struggled with sliders so many times and it keeps skipping past the value I want. 78.5... 79.0... 79.5... 80.5... 79.5... 80.5... I want 80.0! It's especially frustrating with the robotic parts when you haven't set up a controller yet, or don't intend to for that part. Being able to manually enter a number would be a god send.

[Majorjim!]

12 minutes ago, BadOaks said:

it keeps skipping past the value I want

This. It seems that sometimes the value you selected in the lower slider is then 'skipped over' on the top slider..

[BadOaks]

I don't think that's it, as I've seen it when adjusting things like control authority on the elevon parts for example. I think the larger the range of possible values, the more likely it is to skip some of them, possibly due to rounding errors.

[Snark]

1 hour ago, BadOaks said:

I don't think that's it, as I've seen it when adjusting things like control authority on the elevon parts for example. I think the larger the range of possible values, the more likely it is to skip some of them, possibly due to rounding errors.

The problem is that the smallest physical screen amount you can move any slider is going to be 1 pixel.  It's not physically possible to move a mouse any less than that.

So if the number range that the slider covers is bigger than the physical number of pixels that the slider occupies... it's unavoidable that values are going to be skipped.  There's just no way for a slider that's, say, 200 pixels wide, to allow using a mouse to adjust to a range of, say, -177 to +177.  More numbers than pixels equals heartache.

Maybe this could be made "better" by enlarging the UI scale (to provide more pixels and thus a greater range of possible values), but that seems like, 1. a band-aid with limited applicability (no matter how big you make the UI scale, there could be a slider bigger than that sometime), and 2. if you've got the UI scale set where you want it for general playability, it would be kinda irritating to feel forced to enlarge it just for that one thing.

Since the pixels place an inherent "granularity limit" on adjusting a thumb on a slider, that means the only way to really solve it would be to provide some non-slider-drag way of adjusting the numbers.  A text input box, like @Majorjim! suggests, could do that... though it might be a bit of a UI challenge to squeeze that into the PAW without eating up screen real estate and/or generating clutter.  Another idea that occurs to me, which would be less UI-intrusive (but also less flexible than a text entry box) would be to put a little "+" button at one end of the slider, and a little "-" button at the other, so that you can click the buttons to adjust the value up or down by one increment at a time. How big an "increment" is could be a configured property of the slider (e.g. maybe it's 1 unit, maybe it's 0.5 or 0.1, etc.-- something appropriate based on the min/max scale of the range).

[severedsolo]

I know Snark won't like this because it's a bit UI heavy (which is fair enough), but I'm adding something similar as an update to PAWS

Didn't mean to make this a "there's a mod for that" post, and I 100% support this being stock, but for now at least...

 

Edited June 17, 2019 by severedsolo

[juanml82]

Or, simpler, use a hotkey to slide in multiples of 5 (say "shift+mouse click). Yes, there will be people who want exactly "82", but I'll guess most people are looking at round numbers, at least most of the time

[zer0Kerbal]

7 hours ago, severedsolo said:

I know Snark won't like this because it's a bit UI heavy (which is fair enough), but I'm adding something similar as an update to PAWS

Didn't mean to make this a "there's a mod for that" post, and I 100% support this being stock, but for now at least...

 

take my KerbalCredits!

also - Precise Editor allows for similar.

 

Still - stock best, and PrecisePAWS like @severedsolo shows, am all for that.

[Guest]

Oh yes. Setting angle limits on collective servos is especially super annoying, you need them to be the same (or reciprocals) on all of the sets, and the things just keep jumping over the value you want.

[Guest]

One way to solve this would be to bind fine adjustment of the number to hover on the control + scroll wheel. Drag into the ballpark, scroll to get it exact.