B9 5.0 pre-release (with download)

[OCAdam]

Mod works very well in 32 bit (as it should), though I wish it were so for x64 (but know that it isn't supported). My laptop must be real special... ATM went bonkers last time I installed it and destroyed both SCANsat and RPM on their displays. Also, adding -force-opengl actually managed to cause KSP to never even reach the squad logo for loading (task manager says it was hovering at around 450-460k of memory use, and would reset down to 400k before slowly going back up to ~450k before repeating). Guess that only works for some, and not others.

As for the actual content of the mod, it's a great lot of parts, though I know you (Chris) are working on HX cockpits for a later B9. However, what about a simple drone part or SAS? I don't suspect it's too hard to modify a current piece to be either, but I've not really looked at modifying the parts to do so myself (mostly because of installing the new commits every day or so). Of course, if the idea is to specifically want players to use RCS to control these behemoths, then that's fine (and actually pretty understandable really).

What I don't get is the balancing for the HX1 size reactor and thruster (in the last commit I installed at least from yesterday). A small bit of math told me that the equivalent of one reactor was about 600 RTGs (would weigh about 48.xx tons). The cost being a bit over 2 million is actually pretty fine (though I didn't run exact numbers for this), but why does the reactor weigh about 50% more than the equivalent in RTGs?

As for the HX thruster, I know you balanced it off of 35 Skippers and 35 LV-Ns, but that means it's far more efficient to literally stick on 35 LV-Ns (excluding the massive parts count now added) and 2 KR-2Ls. Having just 2 KR-2Ls only on that sample craft was giving about 4800 dV @ 5000kN, versus the 3400 dV of the HPD @ 5080kN (also a TWR of 1.9x versus 1.4x, in favor of the KR-2L). The HPD in plasma mode was basically the only place it was worth having (with over 7k dV, though with that minimal thrust, which I don't really mind). Maybe it's just how I think, but it seems more efficient to place 2 KR-2Ls and have a HPD that only had plasma mode, but weighed less (but then again, even more parts isn't an optimal solution either).

[Umlüx]

thank you but its not only the memory usage.

also my VAB gets too crowded i am already searching forever to find parts

[K3-Chris]

Use part catalog? http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/35018-0-23-PartCatalog-2-4-Full-research-compability-ahead!

[m4ti140]

Windows 7 Ultimate x64

Intel Core i7 4790k 4 Ghz

8 GB RAM

KSP v0.24.2.559

32-bit RAM usage, taken at the main menu.

3.23 GB - Standard

1.62 GB - Basic

1.31 GB - Aggressive

Sometimes the game will crash going into the VAB. This does not seem to happen running either texture plugin, so I suspect that this crash is due to hitting the RAM limit. But this has been discussed already so I thought it would just be handy to have the numbers here, if they havn't already.

So far I havn't run into any major problems. x64 seems to crash during load, but it's crashing on a squad part so I don't know what's going on there. It's already been stated that x64 is unstable at best, so I'll leave it at that. The part switching works fine. Fuel tanks swap properly and so do the textures.

The IVAs are really great. The buttons and switches look great and animations are really nice. I like the smooth button press and switch flip, particularly the backlights. It will be really great to eventually fly a ship entirely from IVA. But until there's an easy way of integrating manoeuvre nodes into the IVA, that probably won't happen.

I have no idea how I'll integrate the HX parts, but it will take a lot of creativity on my end. They look great.

Bac9, Taverius and Chris,

Whether or not people say it here, the community really appreciates the hard work that goes into mods - particularly intensely detailed ones like B9. Some people forget how much work goes into these projects, particularly when you're devoting your own free time into it. It's really impressive what you have achieved so far and I'm super excited to see the finished product in 5.1.

So keep up the good work. It's great to have people who are so dedicated to these projects, because otherwise we would be stuck with stock KSP

Hi,

Try running KSP in OpenGL mode, it drastically reduces RAM usage, even more then agressive ATM. You should be able to run this without having to use ATM at all

[Meltafire]

Did anyone tried build a ramp like this one with that B9 5.0+FAR+DeadlyReentry+IR+ may be some active struts? Does It work or it's senseless?

http://imgur.com/z3AYXnG

[The Space Man]

Am i supposed to be getting screen tearing in OpenGL windowed mode? I've added -force-opengl -popupwindow to the shortcut and i still get screen tearing. Before using OpenGL adding -popupwindow removed screen tearing without having to use vsync.

[Donziboy2]

Taverius, any chance in getting a pure LN-V version of the HDP?

[Taverius]

Taverius, any chance in getting a pure LN-V version of the HDP?

Not my decision, but I doubt it.

---

In other news, after mud-wrestling unity a bit, the spotlights can finally change colour. There's no way to make the emissive change colour too, so like the stock spotlights, the mesh will glow white whatever colour your set:

---

#brandidentity

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Edited August 29, 2014 by Taverius

[wasmic]

#brandidentity

http://imgur.com/a/aNNNt

I like number 1 and 2 best though they are a little too simplistic IMO, and number 3 is too rough on the edges.

[K3-Chris]

Some progress here as well, got the camera transforms into the M27, and I've added a fair bit of polish to the MFDs:

(Can click all the images to see full size)

Same splash screen still, will have the correct logo at some point, but note the additional entires in the top menu.

Also I'm experimenting with the green and red icons on the buttons, I quite like them because they make it more clear what the buttons do, I'm considering making the arrows on the other buttons orange (same shade as other B9 props) STBY can be red, home can remain white I guess?

Flight menu (FLT button)

Primary Flight Display (PFD button)

Synthetic Vision Display (SVD button)

Has a new feature, click the button again and it toggles between the 2 inbuilt B9 cameras, one angled fowards, one angled slightly down (10 degrees bellow forwards) and no camera

Sadly the camera behind a projection like that can't have a target marker, or zoom/pan.

Takeoff Assistant (Tof Button)

Put the full-fledged camera selection, pan zoom etc code in there, you can pick between 2 cameras integrated into all B9 cockpits, and the 10 external RPM camera IDs or push the button again to have no camera, sadly the already busy overlay prevents me from giving button labels, but they're identical to the main camera stuff bellow.

Landing Assistant (LND Button)

Same treatment as the takeoff one.

CAM button on the main menu:

3 labeled buttons at the bottom lets you pick between 3 different sets of cameras:

B9 lets you look through the 2 cameras included in all cockpits (Anyone got a better label for that button? 2-4 characters preferably 3)

EXT lets you see through the 10 external camera IDs from external camera parts (I'm making a B9 styled one that's aerodynamic enough to go on the side of planes)

DOCK lets you see from your selected docking port (In TGT aka Target Manager)

The other lables on the main menu are there to tell you what those buttons do once you load up a camera view:

Can switch between the available cameras, the available sets of cameras, pan & zoom, and it shows a marker for your current target as well. Press home to make the camera return to original angle.

Tested it out earlier with an all IVA docking:

(Don't worry I've fixed the text overlap at the top).

Edited August 29, 2014 by K3|Chris

[Guest]

1 Suggestion. If you cannot do this it is fine,In abort for the Crafts you have.. It automatically redirects on the runway. and lands just like a autopilot maybe you can make a mechjeb part that does it. It could be nice as the launch escape system.

[bac9]

Abort button triggers the standard Abort action group you can configure in the VAB/SPH, there is no point in changing it to something that exotic when you can already tie any action to it.

[AccidentalDisassembly]

Hi,

Try running KSP in OpenGL mode, it drastically reduces RAM usage, even more then agressive ATM. You should be able to run this without having to use ATM at all

Are there any settings one can change or secret handshakes that make OpenGL perform as well as non-OpenGL mode (DirectX?) does? For me, it works as advertised - lots less RAM used - but my framerate goes down quite a lot for whatever reason.

Edited August 30, 2014 by AccidentalDisassembly

[OCAdam]

B9 lets you look through the 2 cameras included in all cockpits (Anyone got a better label for that button? 2-4 characters preferably 3)

EXT lets you see through the 10 external camera IDs from external camera parts (I'm making a B9 styled one that's aerodynamic enough to go on the side of planes)

DOCK lets you see from your selected docking port (In TGT aka Target Manager)

Kinda hard to figure another name than simply B9, but why not INT for Integrated (or internal).

[feriofukada]

Am i supposed to be getting screen tearing in OpenGL windowed mode? I've added -force-opengl -popupwindow to the shortcut and i still get screen tearing. Before using OpenGL adding -popupwindow removed screen tearing without having to use vsync.

Using those parameters lessen the load but might slap your game with screen tearing. Learned it the hard way.

[K3-Chris]

My large MFD changes are now live:

Demonstration of the new camera functionality:

Enhance!

Edited August 30, 2014 by K3|Chris

[Murph]

Are there any settings one can change or secret handshakes that make OpenGL perform as well as non-OpenGL mode (DirectX?) does? For me, it works as advertised - lots less RAM used - but my framerate goes down quite a lot for whatever reason.

1) Make sure your GPU drivers are up to date. Both ATI and nVidia cards are used by Apple, where they run exclusively with OpenGL (there is no such thing as Direct* outside MS-land, more or less, only translation/emulation of it). That means that at some level the card vendors do actively try to make sure that their cards reasonably support OpenGL.

2) Try turning some of the graphics options down a little. Sure, there's a warm fuzzy feeling from having all options at max, but it's often hard to tell the difference in quality with them turned down a little (when just playing the game, rather than intentionally staring at it looking for quality).

[blowfish]

HPD (HX1): 42.62m² cross-section

Skipper (2.5m): 4.909m² cross-section

LV-N (1.25m): 1.227m² cross-section

650 * (42.62/4.909) = 5643

60 * (42.62/1.227) = 2084

Now penalize for being multi-mode, and you get the current value.

I might reduce the penalty a bit, but frankly it seems to be working as intended right now.

I think the problem right now is mass, not thrust. To make the HPD work, you need not only the engine, but also capacitors and the reactor which was bumped up significantly in mass too ... at this point it's more mass efficient to have lots of small engines. There should be a multi-mode penalty of course, but as it is you're almost better off carrying multiple engine systems.

[Nsomnia]

Mod works very well in 32 bit (as it should), though I wish it were so for x64 (but know that it isn't supported). My laptop must be real special... ATM went bonkers last time I installed it and destroyed both SCANsat and RPM on their displays. Also, adding -force-opengl actually managed to cause KSP to never even reach the squad logo for loading (task manager says it was hovering at around 450-460k of memory use, and would reset down to 400k before slowly going back up to ~450k before repeating). Guess that only works for some, and not others.

.

I posted questiion about this I have the same issue, let me know if you learn anything.

[Nsomnia]

My large MFD changes are now live:

[satire]Can you plz add a Harrison Ford button that plays "Enhance. Enhance again!" When you move to the second camera.[/satire] Is tht a second camera with separate parameters or the same camera different config.

[Taverius]

I think the problem right now is mass, not thrust. To make the HPD work, you need not only the engine, but also capacitors and the reactor which was bumped up significantly in mass too ... at this point it's more mass efficient to have lots of small engines. There should be a multi-mode penalty of course, but as it is you're almost better off carrying multiple engine systems.

Uh ... you caught a big typo! Seriously, I'm not sure what happened there - the HPD1 should have been 26 tons, not 105. No idea what happened there, but I'll push a fix soon.

Guess that'll learn me to input values at 3am.

[Rothank]

Just wondering... Is it possible to replace the logo shown on displays with a custom one, like our own? I think a lot of people would like it!

[K3-Chris]

Is tht a second camera with separate parameters or the same camera different config.

It's the same camera panned and zoomed.

Just wondering... Is it possible to replace the logo shown on displays with a custom one, like our own? I think a lot of people would like it!

Just replace the logo file GameData\B9_Aerospace\Props\B9_MFD\images\Logo.tga it's 640x640 (same resolution as the monitor) our logo is mostly a transparent border to center it in the middle.

Edited August 30, 2014 by K3|Chris

[feriofukada]

Just checked out the Mk2's IVA RPM Resource Menu. The button for "Total" and the "Helpr" in the Resource menu are on the "Prev" and "Next" buttons instead of the buttons underneath the labels.

[K3-Chris]

That's a very old version of the MFD/IVA, update. When I mention something is now live I mean I just committed it to the repo, to see the changes you need to upgrade your B9 install to the latest version, easiest done by re-downloading the repo and deleting the old B9 files before slotting in the new (to avoid duplicates from stuff being re-named or moved).

But you're right, though I looked at the code, it's not a bug, it's intended to look and work like that, I think it's from Hyamoto's MFDs, reason it works like that is because the resources display is a sub-sub-menu of it's own, if the buttons down there switched to those resource pages resources wouldn't be a sub menu, it would be several pages instead, (if that makes sense) but yeah having which page you're currently on next to other buttons like that is a bit confusing. I'll have to think of alternatives, I have yet to touch the page contents and internal navigation in the info stuff (beyond adding desc), target, gps, mj, vv And I need to normalize colors across pretty much all the pages still (oh joy).

The top menu is the main menu, it contains sub-menus, the bottom row picks a sub-menu, top and bottom rows are basically reserved for higher level navigation, each individual page can only make use of the 7 side buttons (stby and home shuts down the display and returns you to the main menu respectively) and back takes you up/back a step. Except on the camera mode, back used to zoom out and home to re-center the camera.

I also want those lines around the edge to only light up when a button has a function, I know how to do it in a incredibly tedious and labor intensive way (give them all a number/id (same as their button for clarity) and have an animation for each you toggle individually). But I'd prefer to come up with something less... tedious.

Edited August 30, 2014 by K3|Chris