Orbital Survey [v0.9.4 for KSP2 v0.2.1]

[Falki]

6 hours ago, geoz said:

Does the game capture the co-ordinates of  flag plantings?  I'm wondering whether these could show up on the scan maps as markers also.

That's an interesting idea, I'll note it down.

[ExthaseOriginal]

I always get "Above max alt" state.
Currently I use the RA-2 Antenna and tried serveral heights of orbits and even other celestials.

Is this a common bug?

[Falki]

46 minutes ago, ExthaseOriginal said:

I always get "Above max alt" state.
Currently I use the RA-2 Antenna and tried serveral heights of orbits and even other celestials.

Is this a common bug?

Nope, haven't heard anyone mention this. Currently, for visual scans you need to be at about 500 km and for region scans at about 750 km. Part description in the VAB or R&D will tell you that.

[Oak7603]

On 1/11/2024 at 5:38 PM, m4ti140 said:

Regarding this, if I may suggest something:

• Discoverable mapping should require the other two maps to be completed first, at least in the areas discoverables are originally in
• The optimal altitude for them should be 0 m AGL (requiring aerial  survey in case of atmospheric planets) and the penalty should be precision: the map should simply show a circle, with the discoverable at random position within this circle. The lower the scanning altitude was, the smaller the circle should be.
• The site should not be identified (just ??? for name on map) until it is scanned from within a fairly small distance, say 1000m agl, or landed at and taken science from (which would pinpoint the exact position on map)

This would form a gameplay loop where orbital surveys would be used to determine general area for search and then the players would transition to more local and more precise methods until they find the exact location of the anomaly.

 

Does this mean that discoverables don't show in the scan? That's what I was hoping that this mod will reveal.

[Falki]

On 1/21/2024 at 9:15 PM, Oak7603 said:

Does this mean that discoverables don't show in the scan? That's what I was hoping that this mod will reveal.

Not yet. It's planned though, but not in a way that it'll just display them on the map. We're working on a more elaborate approach.

[Oak7603]

Thats great. Also, I can't seem to get unmanned rovers to show on the visual or region maps. I have unmanned rovers on the Mun and Duna that don't show.

[Falki]

6 hours ago, Oak7603 said:

Thats great. Also, I can't seem to get unmanned rovers to show on the visual or region maps. I have unmanned rovers on the Mun and Duna that don't show.

Only vessels with antennae that have the Orbital Survey module appear on the map. That's by design, to limit the impact on performance.

[Falki]

v0.8.0 Revamp of Min/Ideal/Max altitudes

• Introduced Body Categories to which every Celestial Body belongs to. For example: Minmus -> Small, Mun -> Medium, Kerbin -> Large. Each Body Category has different altitudes requirements and for each type of scan.
• Field Of View for each part has been reduced to fit this revamp
• You should notice a significant improvement in performance, especially when scanning small bodies like Gilly, Pol or Minmus
• Gilly Region mapping can now be performed, all bodies are now scannable
• Scanning will now be more difficult, since the scanners cover a smaller area of the body (time warp is your friend)
• To see what altitudes are required you have several options: 1) R&D and VAB part descriptions (press SHIFT for more info), 2) In VAB in PAM (right-click on a part) you can see a preview of required altitudes for any body category, 3) In Flight view when scanning is enabled you'll see the category of the body you're orbiting and altitude stats for it, 4) Wiki here

Dev note on interoperability

• Categories are not hardcoded. They are defined in a Patch Manager library found here. Other mods can override these config values, rename categories or even add new categories when custom planets will be available (x2.5 rescale, RSS, etc.)

Other

• Fixed "KerbinMountain" region localization

--

PAM displays Body Category

 

Part descriptions display stats for all Categories

 

VAB PAM enables preview for all Categories

[rogerawong]

@Falki Are you taking bug reports and feature requests? If so, I have the following to report:

• BUG: Active vessel tracking does not seem to work for ships that don't have an advanced antenna fitted.
  My vessel with a Communotron 16 doesn't draw a dot in the region map. Its mothership with the high gain HG-55 can track itself just fine. 
• REQUEST: print Lat/Lon coordinates below the cursor when hovering over the map.

Edited January 27 by rogerawong

[Spacecat2000]

Bravo Falki! 
At last varied altitudes!  

 

rogerawong that's as intended by Falki.  Only vessels with orbital-survey-capable antennae will appear on the survey screen.

[Falki]

8 hours ago, rogerawong said:

• BUG: Active vessel tracking does not seem to work for ships that don't have an advanced antenna fitted.
  My vessel with a Communotron 16 doesn't draw a dot in the region map. Its mothership with the high gain HG-55 can track itself just fine. 
• REQUEST: print Lat/Lon coordinates below the cursor when hovering over the map.

As Spacecat already pointed out, that's by design. For the request, that is planned

 

4 hours ago, Spacecat2000 said:

Bravo Falki! 
At last varied altitudes!  

Thanks for your help!

[rc51aaron]

I read through but didn't see anything - has anyone had a issue using this with the Flight Plan mod - The scanner map is stuck open, and Flight Plan is just locked on, can't use Flight Plan

Edit - The map is fine but Flight Plan Doesn't work - I will head over there and check..

Update - removed Manuever Node Controller - Works perfect now

 

Edited January 27 by rc51aaron

[GoldenCat]

What's the plan for this mod going forward? You stated that POIs would be a later addition, but what is the timeline for the near future?

[Falki]

4 hours ago, GoldenCat said:

What's the plan for this mod going forward? You stated that POIs would be a later addition, but what is the timeline for the near future?

My personal plan is to play the game a bit, take a little rest from modding  . I've neglected playtesting. Need to complete the playthrough to see the story line to the end and to see all the missions.

Next for the mod will be either additing waypoints by clicking on the map or a way to find the discoverables. From now on updates will probably be less frequent since the discoverables will be a bit more complex to implement.

[Xilis]

If you scan a planet to 100% but crash your craft into the planet before transmitting the science is there a way to recover it? Can you scan the planet again to get the milestones?

[Falki]

2 hours ago, Xilis said:

If you scan a planet to 100% but crash your craft into the planet before transmitting the science is there a way to recover it? Can you scan the planet again to get the milestones?

No. It's an edge case that isn't supported currently. Your only option is to load a previous save.

[LincolnTheNerd]

Do you plan on adding custom parts for this mod?

[Schneider21]

4 hours ago, Xilis said:

If you scan a planet to 100% but crash your craft into the planet before transmitting the science is there a way to recover it? Can you scan the planet again to get the milestones?

Lol, how would one even go about doing that on accident?

[Sade]

9 minutes ago, Schneider21 said:

Lol, how would one even go about doing that on accident?

it's required by law, Murphies law

[Falki]

4 hours ago, LincolnTheNerd said:

Do you plan on adding custom parts for this mod?

It's on the roadmap, but it won't be soon.

[LincolnTheNerd]

13 hours ago, Falki said:

It's on the roadmap, but it won't be soon.

Ok, thank you for responding.

[rogerawong]

On 1/24/2024 at 9:16 AM, Falki said:

Only vessels with antennae that have the Orbital Survey module appear on the map. That's by design, to limit the impact on performance.

Falki, can you say more about the impact on performance?  Because the logical conclusion to this is that we need to equip all our craft with these special antennas, which seems as if we will end up creating the very scenario you're trying to avoid.

To that end, I'm not sure what the "Track active vessel" toggle does, because every vessel in orbit with a region/visual antenna is tracked on the map.

Would only turning tracking on for vessels with an active "track vessel" flag resolve whatever performance issue you're trying to avoid?

[Falki]

11 minutes ago, rogerawong said:

Falki, can you say more about the impact on performance?  Because the logical conclusion to this is that we need to equip all our craft with these special antennas, which seems as if we will end up creating the very scenario you're trying to avoid.

To that end, I'm not sure what the "Track active vessel" toggle does, because every vessel in orbit with a region/visual antenna is tracked on the map.

Would only turning tracking on for vessels with an active "track vessel" flag resolve whatever performance issue you're trying to avoid?

I wanted to avoid tracking every single vessel existing in the game, because they tend to build up with various debries left around after missions. And I wanted to avoid constantly pinging the game to check if there are new vessels. So there's a sort of "registration" taking place where every antenna with the Orbital Survey capability registers itself for tracking when it's first created. And by "tracking" I mean that the vessel's position on the map UI, vessel name, geo coordinates and marker colors are being updated.

Impact on performance comes from active scanning, because texture manipulation is costly. There are no performance issues with tracking vessels on the map, but still, I wanted to avoid potential issues in the future, better safe than sorry.

"Track active vessel" toggle is only for the active vessel (the one you're currently controling). When you zoom in on the map then click on that toggle, the map will center itself on the active vessel and will move around with the vessel, keeping it centered in the UI. Kinda like mini maps in other games. If you're zoomed all the way out, that toggle isn't doing anything since it cannot move the map outside its defined borders.

So in conclusion, you can safely add anntenae to vessels you want to have displayed on the map, you don't need to worry about performance.

[rogerawong]

Thanks so much for that summary, I appreciate the care and thought you put into it and for the reassurance.

[Rezania]

Science Arrive seems to suggest that we are able scan Kerbal for extra science, is that true? Because I checked orbital distances needed for scanning a large body like Kerbol and I think my ships will just burn up at those distances to the star.