[Early development, 0.24] Kopernicus Planetary System Modifier

[_Augustus_]

Yes, Sentar is possible, though also, possible is that he has a CFG reading system already set up. That could be useful if you would like something to work with when implementing a file reader if that type of thing would be useful.

We have a problem.

OvenProofMars, the rest of the development team and I of StarSystems are gonna be making a planet API (Possibly VERY easy to port over PFCE planets with), and I personally think that we should either have compatibility with each other or merge, as I don't think competition would make sense or be fair.

[Mr Shifty]

A lot of KSP's code directly reads rotation as a linear angle (in degrees!) rather than an orientation. So no, axial tilt very, very probably is impossible short of code changes.

I took a quick look at the API online here at work today. (I won't have access to the actual object browser until I get home, so can't confirm now.) But it looks like CelestialBody has a "rotation" field that is a QuaternionD. When I get home, I'll take a look at the value of the field for existing planets. (I suspect (0,1,0,0) or something similar.) If they're all the same, maybe all we would have to do is redefine that field as a unit pure quaternion pointing in the direction of the desired axis of rotation, with "rotationPeriod" giving the speed of rotation, "initialRotation" giving the starting angle (in degrees), and "rotationAngle" giving its current rotation angle (in degrees) around the axis. Has anyone tried it? I mean if you have the unit quaternion of the axis all you need is a single angle to easily apply the rotation to a set of position quaternions.

EDIT: OK, I actually see this in NK's RSS code, commented out, so I'll assume it doesn't work.

Edited August 7, 2014 by Mr Shifty

[LaydeeDem]

We have a problem.

OvenProofMars, the rest of the development team and I of StarSystems are gonna be making a planet API (Possibly VERY easy to port over PFCE planets with), and I personally think that we should either have compatibility with each other or merge, as I don't think competition would make sense or be fair.

It'd probably be best to move your mod over to Kopernicus. Planet Factory is no longer supported, impossible to update without legal issues, and to be honest, kinda hacky in comparison. It'd be better to create new bodies rather than duplicate existing ones.

[Mr Shifty]

Planet Factory is no longer supported, impossible to update without legal issues

Yesterday, Krag popped in for 2 minutes to change the license to GPL, so it's fully updatable now.

[BryceSchroeder]

Yesterday, Krag popped in for 2 minutes to change the license to GPL, so it's fully updatable now.

Yes, that's actually good news for us - we've been talking, and we've got Krag's blessing to port the PlanetFactory default planets to Kopernicus. So, there should be no problems porting PF configurations that depend on PF planets (e.g. Sentar) to Kopernicus, and also you'll be able to enjoy Krag's classic planets and the technical advantages of Kopernicus at the same time.

Edited August 8, 2014 by BryceSchroeder

[Teknoman117]

Yesterday, Krag popped in for 2 minutes to change the license to GPL, so it's fully updatable now.

True, but that doesn't change how hacky Planet Factory is.

On Augustus's note, I should mention our config structure will not be the same as planet factory, although I will write a conversion script. This decision is mainly due to the fact that PF's config isn't particularly friendly to Module Manager. I've come up with a new config structure that is very friendly to MM (thanks Nathan Kell!). The config loader is based on reflection and member attribution to reduce the amount of boilerplate code I have to write to load an object from config nodes. I'm quite proud of it! System rearrangement is very easy, all you'd have to do is write a module manager config to make a very heavy central body and overwrite the sun's reference body.

By the end of this weekend the config system should be ready for public stress testing.

Edit - started writing this before Bryce's post....

Edited August 8, 2014 by Teknoman117

[Christoph1337]

Two questions (which may have already been answered):

1. Will this mod be compatible with StarSystems?

2. Will this mod allow for customized science for planets?

[BryceSchroeder]

Two questions (which may have already been answered):

1. Will this mod be compatible with StarSystems?

2. Will this mod allow for customized science for planets?

1. That is a difficult question that we are investigating along a number of lines.

2. It is fully integrated with the science archives and new planets can have custom biomes.

[MrHappyFace]

Two questions (which may have already been answered):

1. Will this mod be compatible with StarSystems?

2. Will this mod allow for customized science for planets?

I'm pretty sure you could also use module manager to add custom messages to the sciencedefs.cfg

[Dooz]

If you are porting over Sentar will it have rings?

[BryceSchroeder]

If you are porting over Sentar will it have rings?

Rings are something we've talked about, yes, and I'd consider it not Sentar without rings Also, several Sol system bodies have rings, most notably Saturn, so we'll need rings for the primary mission of Kopernicus anyway.

[aftokinito]

Rings are something we've talked about, yes, and I'd consider it not Sentar without rings Also, several Sol system bodies have rings, most notably Saturn, so we'll need rings for the primary mission of Kopernicus anyway.

Make sure you render the texture twice with one being upside down or it will only render if you look at it from above, just like with PF:CE.

[Teknoman117]

All we need to do is use a double sided shader =P. Unity's shader lab has a "double sided" flag.

[Teknoman117]

Two questions (which may have already been answered):

1. Will this mod be compatible with StarSystems?

2. Will this mod allow for customized science for planets?

2) StarSystems at present is not compatible with Kopernicus

It appears that Star Systems operates in a similar fashion to Planet Factory, in that it changes the celestial body arrangement after the PSystem is spawned. However, I don't recall the behavior of OnLevelWasLoaded(int i) in a behavior which is spawned instantly on the loading of the DLL. If it starts before Kopenicus rewrites the prefab, the mod would have an outdated copy of the prefab. If executed after, then StarSystems would use the updated prefab generated by Kopernicus.

StarSystems only moves the standard planets (hardcoded in at the beginning of StarSystems.cs) to the new sun, so any generated by Kopernicus would be left adrift around the central black hole (star systems uses the original sun as the blackhole). If OvenProofMars is interested, we could merge the star setup code and the star light fixer into Kopernicus (with attribution of course, no one is here to steal or take credit for anyone's work). The star systems introduced configuration could be written as a config file for Kopernicus.

This path seems to make the most sense (to me at least) because at present, Star Systems is at the mercy of some of the issues that plagued PF (live system modification). If Star Systems operated like Kopernicus and did prefab modification, the two mods would be completely incompatible.

Edited August 8, 2014 by Teknoman117

[InfinityArch]

Regarding a basic set of planet to use for this, instead of fully porting over Sentar, perhaps you could use the description of the second gas giant in the kerbol system we got from NovaSilko ages ago and is not especially likely to ever be added given he's no longer a developer. Many of the bodies included in Planet Factory by default resemble Nova's description of GP2, which was slated to have rings as well as a moon on a relatively high inclination orbit called Potatus that spun fast enough to warp it into an oblate spheroid, much like Inacessible from PF's stock planets. Furthermore, Eeloo was slated to be one of GP2's moons, along with a ringed moon called Fonso with a dense atmosphere (twice that of Kerbin's ASL pressure) and large mountains, much like Skelton from PF-CE.

You could keep the name "Sentar" since GP2, unlike its proposed moons was never named, and 3 of its 4 moons are present in the stock game/planet factory, which would only require you to create assets for one new body (A tiny asteroid called Daphy orbiting within the rings of GP2), though I'd recommend reducing the absurdly high surface gravities of Inacessible (Potatus) for its size if you were planning to recreate Nova's idea of GP2. I also kind of doubt GP2 would have a 45 degree inclination to Kerbol, nor would any of its moons, which was another thing that kind of bugged me about the original Sentar.

Edited August 8, 2014 by InfinityArch

[Teknoman117]

Yeah, the 45 degree orbital inclination is rather unrealistic ... unless it was a captured rouge planet, major planets always seem to lay within a few degrees of the equatorial plane of the star they orbit. Take Saturn for instance, it's inclined by 5.51 degrees.

For reference, the post InfinityArch is referring to is located here:

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/29807-Planet-Ideas-And-Names-For-The-Future-Of-Kerbal-Space-Program?p=447959&viewfull=1#post447959

[_Augustus_]

2) StarSystems at present is not compatible with Kopernicus

It appears that Star Systems operates in a similar fashion to Planet Factory, in that it changes the celestial body arrangement after the PSystem is spawned. However, I don't recall the behavior of OnLevelWasLoaded(int i) in a behavior which is spawned instantly on the loading of the DLL. If it starts before Kopenicus rewrites the prefab, the mod would have an outdated copy of the prefab. If executed after, then StarSystems would use the updated prefab generated by Kopernicus.

StarSystems only moves the standard planets (hardcoded in at the beginning of StarSystems.cs) to the new sun, so any generated by Kopernicus would be left adrift around the central black hole (star systems uses the original sun as the blackhole). If OvenProofMars is interested, we could merge the star setup code and the star light fixer into Kopernicus (with attribution of course, no one is here to steal or take credit for anyone's work). The star systems introduced configuration could be written as a config file for Kopernicus.

This path seems to make the most sense (to me at least) because at present, Star Systems is at the mercy of some of the issues that plagued PF (live system modification). If Star Systems operated like Kopernicus and did prefab modification, the two mods would be completely incompatible.

I would ask him but he's really inactive right now.

[Mr Shifty]

I also kind of doubt GP2 would have a 45 degree inclination to Kerbol, nor would any of its moons, which was another thing that kind of bugged me about the original Sentar.

Triton's orbit is inclined 50° relative to Neptune's orbit, in a retrograde direction.

[aftokinito]

Triton's orbit is inclined 50° relative to Neptune's orbit, in a retrograde direction.

Triton is a captured moon thought, retrograde moons cannot form from the same nebulae material as planets they orbit.

[gutza1]

Regarding a basic set of planet to use for this, instead of fully porting over Sentar, perhaps you could use the description of the second gas giant in the kerbol system we got from NovaSilko ages ago and is not especially likely to ever be added given he's no longer a developer. Many of the bodies included in Planet Factory by default resemble Nova's description of GP2, which was slated to have rings as well as a moon on a relatively high inclination orbit called Potatus that spun fast enough to warp it into an oblate spheroid, much like Inacessible from PF's stock planets. Furthermore, Eeloo was slated to be one of GP2's moons, along with a ringed moon called Fonso with a dense atmosphere (twice that of Kerbin's ASL pressure) and large mountains, much like Skelton from PF-CE.

You could keep the name "Sentar" since GP2, unlike its proposed moons was never named, and 3 of its 4 moons are present in the stock game/planet factory, which would only require you to create assets for one new body (A tiny asteroid called Daphy orbiting within the rings of GP2), though I'd recommend reducing the absurdly high surface gravities of Inacessible (Potatus) for its size if you were planning to recreate Nova's idea of GP2. I also kind of doubt GP2 would have a 45 degree inclination to Kerbol, nor would any of its moons, which was another thing that kind of bugged me about the original Sentar.

Actually, I was working on a PF implementation of Nova's GP2 as well as other planets. However, PF's brokenness and my complete lack of artistic skills(I cannot texture for the life of me) caused me to give up on the project. I could be the main designer of a "Nova's Planets" pack. Even if I do not get the job, here are my ideas for the planets:

Sentar: A white gas giant that is 9000 km in diameter. Its main noticable features are a large ring system and a hexagontal storm at its North Pole. It is the next planet after Jool and was the last one that was known to Kerbals since antiquity.

Eeloo(orbit shifted if this mod allows to make current celestial objects orbit the new ones): Orbits close to Sentar's rings. The closest moon of Sentar has an undergroud ocean due to the tidal stress generated by the moon's proximity to its parent planet(basically, it's an Enceladus analogue).

Daphy: A small ball of ice. It is the second moon of Sentar, but its eccentric orbit occasionally takes it closer than Eeloo and into the rings(think Neptune and Pluto), where Daphy smashes the ice debris(Senat's rings are made of ice) into a fine icy "fluff" and slowly compacts the already existing "fluff" into ice. A large gash near the equator formed by a long-ago impact exposes the ice layers beneath the "fluff".

Potatus: The third moon of Sentar that resides on a retrograde orbit and rotates extremely quickly. The moon's rotation rate and color give it its name. The rotation speed also makes landing with legs impossible except near the poles, where the groud rotates slowly enough to make a safe landing. By trying to land a probe at the poles and experiencing the phantom forces that arise, one can understand just how [EXPLETIVE REDACTED]-up this moon is.

Fonso: Basically Titan WITH GIANT MOUNTAINS. Fonso is the only moon in the Kerbol system other than Laythe to have a substantial atmosphere. Its other noticeable features include Kethane/Karbonite oceans and extremely tall mountains, the tallest of which extend a couple of hundred meters above Fonso's atmosphere. With Mun-like gravity and an atmosphere 1.7 times as thick as Kerbin's at sea level, Fonso is truly a spaceplane's paradise. seriously, a kerbal could fly on this moon just by duct-taping wings to his/her arms and run off a cliff.

[Kragrathea]

Yes, Sentar is possible, though also, possible is that he has a CFG reading system already set up. That could be useful if you would like something to work with when implementing a file reader if that type of thing would be useful.

The CFG reading code is one part of the PF code that might actually be worth reusing. It uses reflection to Create/Delete/Modify PQS mods on a planet based on a CFG file. I was in the process of expanding it to work on any GameObject/Component. The function is public static void LoadPQS(string bodyName) in PlanetFactory.cs in the CE branch

The tricky part is creating a PQS when you only have a string of the type. This also supports CFG loading on custom PQS.

Krag

Edited August 9, 2014 by Kragrathea

[metaphor]

I thought the reason Sentar was in such an inclined orbit was so that its rings could be easily visible. If its orbit had low inclination, the rings would always be edge-on to the Sun and would appear dark. It comes back to the problem with axial tilt not being modifiable.

This is also why moons in equatorial orbits around ringed planets aren't really that visually interesting.

Maybe Krag can say more about this.

[Teknoman117]

Actually, I was working on a PF implementation of Nova's GP2 as well as other planets. However, PF's brokenness and my complete lack of artistic skills(I cannot texture for the life of me) caused me to give up on the project. I could be the main designer of a "Nova's Planets" pack. Even if I do not get the job, here are my ideas for the planets:

Sentar: A white gas giant that is 9000 km in diameter. Its main noticable features are a large ring system and a hexagontal storm at its North Pole. It is the next planet after Jool and was the last one that was known to Kerbals since antiquity.

Eeloo(orbit shifted if this mod allows to make current celestial objects orbit the new ones): Orbits close to Sentar's rings. The closest moon of Sentar has an undergroud ocean due to the tidal stress generated by the moon's proximity to its parent planet(basically, it's an Enceladus analogue).

Daphy: A small ball of ice. It is the second moon of Sentar, but its eccentric orbit occasionally takes it closer than Eeloo and into the rings(think Neptune and Pluto), where Daphy smashes the ice debris(Senat's rings are made of ice) into a fine icy "fluff" and slowly compacts the already existing "fluff" into ice. A large gash near the equator formed by a long-ago impact exposes the ice layers beneath the "fluff".

Potatus: The third moon of Sentar that resides on a retrograde orbit and rotates extremely quickly. The moon's rotation rate and color give it its name. The rotation speed also makes landing with legs impossible except near the poles, where the groud rotates slowly enough to make a safe landing. By trying to land a probe at the poles and experiencing the phantom forces that arise, one can understand just how [EXPLETIVE REDACTED]-up this moon is.

Fonso: Basically Titan WITH GIANT MOUNTAINS. Fonso is the only moon in the Kerbol system other than Laythe to have a substantial atmosphere. Its other noticeable features include Kethane/Karbonite oceans and extremely tall mountains, the tallest of which extend a couple of hundred meters above Fonso's atmosphere. With Mun-like gravity and an atmosphere 1.7 times as thick as Kerbin's at sea level, Fonso is truly a spaceplane's paradise. seriously, a kerbal could fly on this moon just by duct-taping wings to his/her arms and run off a cliff.

If this is what you want to do - then do it! Kopernicus is meant to give the community the ability to make whatever systems they want! You don't need our permission!

That being said, I only have one comment on the idea. I'd rename GP2 to Sentinel - mainly to differentiate from the Sentar expansion PF provided (which we will make available as a separate package - unless someone beats us to it ). Going with the theme of the farthest planet known to kerbal antiquity, the mythos could be that it stood as sentinel on the edge of the solar system.

[Teknoman117]

I thought the reason Sentar was in such an inclined orbit was so that its rings could be easily visible. If its orbit had low inclination, the rings would always be edge-on to the Sun and would appear dark. It comes back to the problem with axial tilt not being modifiable.

This is also why moons in equatorial orbits around ringed planets aren't really that visually interesting.

Maybe Krag can say more about this.

We could just tilt the rings to the equatorial plane ... and attach a script that cancels the planet's rotation out for the rings.

[KCreator]

We could just tilt the rings to the equatorial plane ... and attach a script that cancels the planet's rotation out for the rings.

I tried using a script, although poorly written, to cancel out rotation on rings, it however, looked rather wonky in high time warp. I guess I should have used FixedUpdate and LateUpdate.