How do I make Girder Segments have connection points in the middle?

[Benie]

See the title. I need to have connection points in the middle of the Girder Segments. I know it's possible, but I know very little of coding .cfg files.

For example, the 'Modular Girder Segment', I want to have connection points on all four sizes of it, in the middle.

[KhaosCorp]

You would need to define the placement of the nodes in the 'node definitions' part of the config.

You will need to add 4 stack nodes ( node_stack_side1 will work, do 1-4) and then define their location and orientation.

All defined positions are from an objects origin. The format is: position X,Y,Z up x,y,z

so the first 3 numbers are the nodes distance from the origin, the last 3 numbers define the direction a node faces in order to attach to other nodes.

Without having the model in Unity you just have to kinda guess and test where nodes need to be.

[Benie]

Hmm. I was hoping to get help of where to place the nodes for both truss parts.

I haven't the patience to learn Unity. I feel the editor should go to hell and be replaced with an unlimited; "build how you want with no connection limits" version.

Sorry, but I hate...hate the editor. It's ruining my creativity.

What I want to do, is connect a Vertical truss to a Horizontal one, which is already connected to another Vertical one. Like this;

|-|

Pretty much an H shape.

But with the connection nodes, I cannot connect the second Vertical truss to the Horizontal one.

Edited July 24, 2013 by Benie

[KhaosCorp]

You misunderstand me, you don't need to use Unity to get this done. All you have to do is go into the config and add some stack nodes in the right location. The trusses are rather uniform in size and shape so it shouldn't be to hard to estimate the location the nodes need to be. You may have to tweek them a bit and reload it a couple times.

Here is the wiki explaining part configs, maybe the bit about node definitions can explain it better than my first post.

http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/CFG_File_Documentation

Also, what you said being able to build without connection points (nodes) would not be possible. At its core KSP is a physics simulation. The nodes need to be there for the physics of 2 parts connected mechanicaly to be simulated with any accuracy. Even radialy attached parts that seem to be 'place anywhere' have clear defined attach node.

[Benie]

I read that Wiki page. It made some sense, but not really what I'm looking for.

I tried to use the same "formula" as the 'stationHub' part. I noticed it had node_stack_right, left, back, front.

Seeing this is the same principle of what I need, I copied what was there of 'trussPiece3x' and did the following, over node_stack_top;

node_stack_right = 0.0, 0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_left = 0.0, -0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_back = 0.0, 0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_front = 0.0, -0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_bottom = 0.0, 0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1

So it pretty much looks like this, with node_stack_top;

node_stack_right = 0.0, 0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_left = 0.0, -0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_back = 0.0, 0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_front = 0.0, -0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_bottom = 0.0, -0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_stack_top = 0.0, 0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0, 1
node_attach = 0.0, -0.5592728, 0.0, 0.0, -1.0, 0.0

It was pretty much the same as 'stationHub' from what I saw, of the same second number being copied/pasted, but a "-" after each second one. So I took this and trussPiece1x, and threw them in my modded parts folder in GameData. The original part.cfg files are still in /Squad/Structural/trussPiece3x and trussPiece1x.

With that, I tried loading. The "modified" pieces showed up in the Editor as they were supposed to (I had changed the description to show the change), but the connection nodes are unchanged (why I had modified quoted).

What am I doing wrong? Is it the third set of '1.0' what's throwing me off?

Edited July 24, 2013 by Benie