Milestone Reached - 0.23 is Now in Experimentals Phase

[Superfluous J]

Let's all hope to God that they don't announce the release date beforehand again. That didn't exactly go over too well last time.

Yeah I don't remember anything going wrong with that. Seemed to go pretty smooth after the admittedly slow download completed. But you're going to have slow downloads of popular software when it releases whether they announce it or not.

[numerobis]

They announced the date, then people were hitting reload like cocaine-addicted rats starting at midnight on the international date line and within hours started posting impatient messages on the forum. Apart from that, it went perfectly.

[Superfluous J]

They announced the date, then people were hitting reload like cocaine-addicted rats starting at midnight on the international date line and within hours started posting impatient messages on the forum. Apart from that, it went perfectly.

It was at WORST as bad as all the prior updates where people asked every 5 minutes when it was coming out.

[SkyRender]

We're 48 days out from the last release, by my estimate. If the next version comes out during KerbalCon (which I would not be surprised if that were the goal!), that would make the gap between versions a mere 58 days. The last time the release span between major revisions was that short or less was before the game even went pay-to-play. (Specifically, the gap between 0.12 and 0.13 was 35 days. The shortest since was 0.16 to 0.17, with a development cycle of 61 days. 0.20 to 0.21 was only 1 day longer than that, but still.)

[Marcuzzi]

I love how this community nit picks and breaks down every little thing SQUAD does, only to push them to move faster, yet is still amazed every time SQUAD does actually (which is quite often) keep the pace. Not only that but they take on people to give out more information and allow an almost transparent view into what they are doing. Wait, what are they doing? EXPERIMENTALS! Oh SQUAD, congrats on everything you have accomplished! Awesome company, awesome community!

[Monger]

I love how this community nit picks and breaks down every little thing SQUAD does, only to push them to move faster, yet is still amazed every time SQUAD does actually (which is quite often) keep the pace.

I know it sounds a little unfair, but the high pace is in SQUADs best interest. They are a young software team. It would be really bad if they were unable to improve their efficiency.

Then again, they really did an amazing job. Many other software studios failed at exactly this point (see Egosoft, who apparently failed to keep control on their development cycle). For example, I supported an RTS game a few years back which was centered around time travel. Up to the final release it got quite a lot of attention, but then the players were just leaving. The forum is more or less dead now, because the developer failed to create a consistent game instead of a bundle of cool features.

So yeah, gratz SQUAD! Keep up the good work, and you have a promising future (beyond KSP, I hope).

[Dun Kirk]

Cool. Alot of cool stuff has been mentioned in the dev notes. Will be neat to see.

[Caelib]

Here's hoping today is a video of the .23 features!

[eeveelution]

Experimental testing means nothing more then releasing a beta kind of version into a controlled group of users. There may be some Youtubers out there, but Experimentals doesn't mean it's open to the public yet. It's simply bug testing in a larger and -more importantly- controlled group of users using different operation systems, using different computers, with different hardware.

If you do sign up for that kind of testing, you sign a form. And on this form you signed, you keep things to yourself untill Squad gives the clear. Something like that. They can't just simply make a video and dump it on Youtube or something like that..

Ok, thanks

I knew about he thing that a certain group of users (youtubers mostly, I belive) get the thing, I just wasn't sure if they get it when experimentals come out or do they get it a bit later.

[Cdodders]

Quick q, when it does update,.will I lose mods and or launched spacecraft?

[softweir]

There is never any guarantee that mods and/or ships will survive an update. Your best bet is to avoid updating until you know if the mods you use are OK or have been updated.

If you bought over Steam then you will need to go into KSP->Properties->Updates and choose Never Update - I believe Steam has been altered to treat this as a refusal to update, whereas previously it would consider this a polite request that it leave updates until the moment you try to play a game, and THEN force an update on you!

[John FX]

Any data you have not backed up is data you do not care about.

[Palleas]

Any data you have not backed up is data you do not care about.

Love:) the back-up extremists

[AngelLestat]

what milestone means? Why is called that way??

[KasperVld]

what milestone means? Why is called that way??

Milestones mean important events in a person's life or career, in the history of a nation, in the life of some project, etc.^source. KSP uses the word to indicate that development has reached a new important step along the way of it being released. Each new version is developed by the developers and simultaneously tested by QA team. After every feature has been added the new version goes into 'experimentals' in which it is tested by a larger group of very nitpicky people who find a lot of major and minor flaws which have to be fixed before it is released. After experimentals the new version is released to the public.

[Giovanni.Lucifugo]

what milestone means? Why is called that way??

The term "mile" derives from the latin mille passuum, with the meaning of one thousand steps. That was a common measurement of distances, and armies often used to plant a stick every thousand steps. That was incorporated in the roman road system, with engraved stones placed every thousand steps, that took the name of "lapis miliarium" then "pietra miliare" in italian and "milestone" in english.

[Papa_Joe]

can anyone comment on the "average" length of previous Experimental phases?

Since no one actually answered your question, I thought I might give it a shot.

Experimental testing periods have varied over that past year. When they first came out, the development process for squad was still in it's infancy. They had not really considered a truly methodical testing process until then.

Subsequent releases have had experimental cycles ranging from days to weeks. It is largely driven by the features/optimizations/bug fixes included in that particular build.

However, I have noticed that since instituting the new Source Control System, and bringing on board a test engineer, they have significantly reduced the QA and experimental test periods.

If I had to guess, and it would only be a guess, I think we will see it Friday. REMEMBER: this is only a guess and I have no inside information.

[Marcuzzi]

If I had to guess, and it would only be a guess, I think we will see it Friday. REMEMBER: this is only a guess and I have no inside information.

Friday of next week seems like a better guess, I read somewhere on these forums during the first KerbalKon they released 0.18 (hopefully that number is right), which make me think they will be releasing 0.23 around the same time. If you think of marketing you want to have as much attention as possible before you release a product. Yes, all of us on these forums begging for updates will know within 24 hours (more like 2 - 4 hours for most of us ) but for the people who have never heard of KSP, it makes more sense to gain as much publicity before releasing an update.

[czokletmuss]

Question to SQUAD - can we expect HarvesteR blog post about 0.23 this week?

[jjwb22101]

.23 in 5.. 4... 3... 2... 1... Soonâ„¢

Love it. So true. 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... "soon."

Well soon can never be soon enough. I can't wait!!!

[Caelib]

Keep an eye out on Tumblr, the forum and all of our other social media outposts for further news. * * **

So ... where is this news? It's been two days ... detailed information on what's in the update would be nice! Thanks.

[KasperVld]

There's a lot of information in various places (like the dev notes that get publsihed every tuesday), I just don't think anyone has bundled it yet

[CaptainArchmage]

What we know about this release is they have refined the way science works and you can now transfer reports and data between crew modules, at least on EVA. There is the science lab, which is massive but gives us a reason to build bases and space stations in career mode now. There are tweakables, so we can expect some engines that take alternative fuels at least as a demonstration. We may be able to do IVA transfers, if only through a menu system (i.e. right-click to open transfer menu, move kerbal from science lab to capsule). The game has undergone a lot of optimisations, so we can expect it to run faster with more parts on ships. Some bugs have been fixed, so we may be able to use right-clicking on the crew hatches on Macs, for example. We will be getting a science archive, so when you learn things about celestial bodies, the reports will be stored in an accessible place. If the optimisations involved RAM usage, we may be able to cope with more planets. I believe that was a requirement for adding them in. In that case you might see a new planet or moon. Alternatively, we could see more planets and moons get the new procedural terrain and biome maps.

I believe the Friday release possibility is reasonable since they are going for a shorter dev cycle and the reasons Papa_Joe went over. They will then talk about near-future developments in Kerbalcon.

[Caelib]

CaptainArchmage ... that's all "overview" stuff that we knew four weeks ago ... the game went to experimentals so I am surprised that virtually no specifics for this update have yet to be release. Even .22 had multiple, detailed updates showing how certain systems work.

[kiwiak]

So.. new planet with 0.23?

Its too good to be true.