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Umbra Space Industries - (Roadmap and WIPs)

RoverDude

By RoverDude
in KSP1 Mod Development

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PDelta41

PDelta41

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Ooh! Pretty. One thing though, right now the Pack-rat has trouble with hills. I hear that adjusting the wheel friction can fix this. Definitely looking forward to seeing the Honey Badger in action (I'm thinking of sticking it on top of a 5m booster stage to get it into orbit). Will it have any utility for docking with a fixed base (say, if I build a large mining outpost and wanted to ferry supplies)?

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marce

marce

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Hey what will your not-KAS mod be called?

KART - Kerbal Attachable/Removable Technologies

KERES - Kerbal Engineering REmovable Systems

KFE - Kerbal Field Engineering

Oh, I completely missed that! Are you planning to build an open successor for KAS like you did with Karbonite for Kethane, Rover?

That’s nice! Majiir is MIA atm and the KAS code still belongs to KospY, so a good alternative would be a very good idea. Good luck with it, maybe you can remove the explosions feature :wink:

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RoverDude

RoverDude

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Ooh! Pretty. One thing though, right now the Pack-rat has trouble with hills. I hear that adjusting the wheel friction can fix this. Definitely looking forward to seeing the Honey Badger in action (I'm thinking of sticking it on top of a 5m booster stage to get it into orbit). Will it have any utility for docking with a fixed base (say, if I build a large mining outpost and wanted to ferry supplies)?

If you have a config tweak let me know, I could use it.

Hey what will your not-KAS mod be called?

KART - Kerbal Attachable/Removable Technologies

KERES - Kerbal Engineering REmovable Systems

KFE - Kerbal Field Engineering

Working title is GrabbyStuff.

Oh, I completely missed that! Are you planning to build an open successor for KAS like you did with Karbonite for Kethane, Rover?

That’s nice! Majiir is MIA atm and the KAS code still belongs to KospY, so a good alternative would be a very good idea. Good luck with it, maybe you can remove the explosions feature :wink:

My VERY strong preference would be for KospY to reclaim it (the whole transfer of copyright thing is bogus without paperwork, and downright shady), and release it under an open license. If models are an issue, I will happily donate new models (and expect a dozen better modelers would jump at the chance).

So in the long haul, one way or the other, we'll have an open and free way of attaching stuff without... 'entanglements'. Again, my preference is for the current restrictive licensing of KAS to be removed so the community can innovate. Barring that, an alternative will be developed.

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marce

marce

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My VERY strong preference would be for KospY to reclaim it (the whole transfer of copyright thing is bogus without paperwork, and downright shady), and release it under an open license. If models are an issue, I will happily donate new models (and expect a dozen better modelers would jump at the chance).

So in the long haul, one way or the other, we'll have an open and free way of attaching stuff without... 'entanglements'. Again, my preference is for the current restrictive licensing of KAS to be removed so the community can innovate. Barring that, an alternative will be developed.

I see. The last time I checked KospY was online on 08/20/2014 so he might be able to react.

I looked through the KAS code few months ago and I agree that it would be much better to be able to start with that (which has a nice level of complexity and already solved problems) than starting from scratch.

Well, I can't model s*** but if I can lend a hand for plugin coding just ask and I'll be happy to through a few hours on it.

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RoverDude

RoverDude

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I see. The last time I checked KospY was online on 08/20/2014 so he might be able to react.

I looked through the KAS code few months ago and I agree that it would be much better to be able to start with that (which has a nice level of complexity and already solved problems) than starting from scratch.

Well, I can't model s*** but if I can lend a hand for plugin coding just ask and I'll be happy to through a few hours on it.

I'll try to PM him. Again, this is one of those things where I don't want to 'muscle in', but if anything the past month has shown us a couple of things.

First... closed licensing sucks. Let's look at three situations... KSPI (open licensed) was forked and improved without a hitch. For Kethane, the community was able to build a replacement in two weeks. And we have KAS as the last one where, thanks to restrictive licensing, the community is going to have to do another rebuild. The commonality is that bad licensing causes us pain, and open licensing lets the community collectively pick up the torch. There will absolutely be a day when I am sick of rocket legos and move on. Or I get hit by a bus. In either case, I sleep very well at night knowing that all of the stuff I made can continue to be maintained and used in my absence.

Second. The community is awesome, and in the end, will absolutely code and model our way around any obstructions to innovation. My very very strong preference is to not have KAS end up in the proverbial dust bin because of it's current (restrictive) nature. But I have no hesitation in going down that path, and expect that anything I tossed out there would have folks a lot smarter than me jumping in to extend and patch any holes.

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marce

marce

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I'll try to PM him. Again, this is one of those things where I don't want to 'muscle in', but if anything the past month has shown us a couple of things.

First... closed licensing sucks. Let's look at three situations... KSPI (open licensed) was forked and improved without a hitch. For Kethane, the community was able to build a replacement in two weeks. And we have KAS as the last one where, thanks to restrictive licensing, the community is going to have to do another rebuild. The commonality is that bad licensing causes us pain, and open licensing lets the community collectively pick up the torch. There will absolutely be a day when I am sick of rocket legos and move on. Or I get hit by a bus. In either case, I sleep very well at night knowing that all of the stuff I made can continue to be maintained and used in my absence.

Second. The community is awesome, and in the end, will absolutely code and model our way around any obstructions to innovation. My very very strong preference is to not have KAS end up in the proverbial dust bin because of it's current (restrictive) nature. But I have no hesitation in going down that path, and expect that anything I tossed out there would have folks a lot smarter than me jumping in to extend and patch any holes.

This. Imho SQUAD should make a permissive license required as well (not only open source).

KSP is not even finished yet. ALL mods will have to be at least updated for months/years to come. That's why I release everything I do under MIT and fully support your efforts RoverDude.

Please keep up the good work!

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sp1989

sp1989

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The one thing I have noticed in the KSP community and this is being said from a person who knows nothing about coding or modeling but has an unmentionable amount of hours playing KSP and using mods. The one thing this community is not good at is evolution. There is a strong sense of preserving instead of moving forward and creating better things. Now I love KAS and I think it is one of the most important mods in the game. Its so important that I don't understand how its not stock. However it has not been updated in quite a few game updates now and it is essentially being held together with duct tape, a very noble and kerbal thing but as mentioned before the new exploding parts feature in KAS is a new but unwanted feature. I know its nostalgic but another example would be Bobcats parts. Everyone loves to cite bobcat and his parts and I have to admit I used them extensively when I first started but he is gone and probably not going to come back any time soon. There are wonderful modders like yourself roverdude who are making wonderful things but for some reason I see way to many posts comparing your MKS/OKS to HOME and people creating threads and demanding Bobcats rovers get updated. Even bobcats parts are being held together with spit and glue. I know I can't assume everyone is a Doctor Who fan but there was great speech by The Doctor in the premiere about fixing things over and over again to the point where it becomes unrecognizable, and I feel thats what preserving old mods is like. People look to bobcat but Dennytx and raidernick are rebuilding the Soviet pack and making better models than bobcat. Roverdude you and Alexustas are making AMAZING colonization parts but people still talk about HOME and want it updated. Im sorry this is a rant but my main point is this if you are up to the task of creating a new version KAS it will certainly be welcome and much needed. It the next logical step KAS is technically dead and its time to move forward. Even if KAS gets updated its old and has no way to be expanded by the community. You just made Karbonite even though Kethane is alive and popular. Its time to move forward and waiting for the old Mods to come back to life will just leave us stuck in the past. I know a lot of people embraced Karbonite, but thats because how awesome it is, and because its open source. I don't know but at least to me there are not alot of people on here especially the veteran forum members who don't like change. So keep doing what you are doing roverdude and two years from now when maybe your interest in KSP is long gone there will be people demanding your packs get updated by others.

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marce

marce

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The one thing I have noticed in the KSP community and this is being said from a person who knows nothing about coding or modeling but has an unmentionable amount of hours playing KSP and using mods. The one thing this community is not good at is evolution. There is a strong sense of preserving instead of moving forward and creating better things. Now I love KAS and I think it is one of the most important mods in the game. Its so important that I don't understand how its not stock. However it has not been updated in quite a few game updates now and it is essentially being held together with duct tape, a very noble and kerbal thing but as mentioned before the new exploding parts feature in KAS is a new but unwanted feature. I know its nostalgic but another example would be Bobcats parts. Everyone loves to cite bobcat and his parts and I have to admit I used them extensively when I first started but he is gone and probably not going to come back any time soon. There are wonderful modders like yourself roverdude who are making wonderful things but for some reason I see way to many posts comparing your MKS/OKS to HOME and people creating threads and demanding Bobcats rovers get updated. Even bobcats parts are being held together with spit and glue. I know I can't assume everyone is a Doctor Who fan but there was great speech by The Doctor in the premiere about fixing things over and over again to the point where it becomes unrecognizable, and I feel thats what preserving old mods is like. People look to bobcat but Dennytx and raidernick are rebuilding the Soviet pack and making better models than bobcat. Roverdude you and Alexustas are making AMAZING colonization parts but people still talk about HOME and want it updated. Im sorry this is a rant but my main point is this if you are up to the task of creating a new version KAS it will certainly be welcome and much needed. It the next logical step KAS is technically dead and its time to move forward. Even if KAS gets updated its old and has no way to be expanded by the community. You just made Karbonite even though Kethane is alive and popular. Its time to move forward and waiting for the old Mods to come back to life will just leave us stuck in the past. I know a lot of people embraced Karbonite, but thats because how awesome it is, and because its open source. I don't know but at least to me there are not alot of people on here especially the veteran forum members who don't like change. So keep doing what you are doing roverdude and two years from now when maybe your interest in KSP is long gone there will be people demanding your packs get updated by others.

@RoverDude: sorry for off-topic. I feel that this is important.

Disclaimer: I can’t model anything, but I can code so this is only related to plugins.

In general I agree with you. We should not only revive but supersede the plugins.

But KSP is special. There are two main problems:

  1. We have no real documentation. There is a community effort, but it’s not even remotely enough. So a lot of development without an existing mod as reference is stupid trial and error to figure out what this method does or that property actually represents.
  2. Modders can’t debug. Yes we can print debug statements but that’s only a bad joke compared to attaching a debugger which most of us are used to.

The consequence is, that writing an amazing plugin from scratch literally wastes hundreds of hours (mostly trial & error + horrible loading times when checking compatibility with other mods; the coding itself (once the API is understandable) is not that a big deal) “ducktaping†an old one may cost only a few. Modders are working for free and don’t have unlimited time, so reviving old (tested!!!) plugins has to be preferred compared to not being able to complete a new one at all.

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RoverDude

RoverDude

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@RoverDue: sorry for off-topic. I feel that this is important.

Disclaimer: I can’t model anything, but I can code so this is only related to plugins.

In general I agree with you. We should not only revive but supersede the plugins.

But KSP is special. There are two main problems:

  1. We have no real documentation. There is a community effort, but it’s not even remotely enough. So a lot of development without an existing mod as reference is stupid trial and error to figure out what this method does or that property actually represents.
  2. Modders can’t debug. Yes we can print debug statements but that’s only a bad joke compared to attaching a debugger which most of us are used to.

The consequence is, that writing an amazing plugin from scratch literally wastes hundreds of hours (mostly trial & error + horrible loading times when checking compatibility with other mods; the coding itself (once the API is understandable) is not that a big deal) “ducktaping†an old one may cost only a few. Modders are working for free and don’t have unlimited time, so reviving old (tested!!!) plugins has to be preferred compared to not being able to complete a new one at all.

Yup, agree. Which is why I'm pretty passionate about open licensing. None of us are making a living off of this, and none of us will ever be able to monetize KSP plugins (unless we're lucky enough to get picked up by Squad). And all of us, at some point, will be doing other stuff. It's reality. There is no harm in open licensing. I occasionally hear people harp about 'vision'. My stuff has a clear vision, but if someone came along tomorrow and forked and made a better vision, I'd either roll it back in and expand on it, or let them go forth and rock on. Either way, open is good. And when I can avoid reinventing the wheel, even better ;)

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sp1989

sp1989

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@RoverDude: sorry for off-topic. I feel that this is important.

Disclaimer: I can’t model anything, but I can code so this is only related to plugins.

In general I agree with you. We should not only revive but supersede the plugins.

But KSP is special. There are two main problems:

  1. We have no real documentation. There is a community effort, but it’s not even remotely enough. So a lot of development without an existing mod as reference is stupid trial and error to figure out what this method does or that property actually represents.
  2. Modders can’t debug. Yes we can print debug statements but that’s only a bad joke compared to attaching a debugger which most of us are used to.

The consequence is, that writing an amazing plugin from scratch literally wastes hundreds of hours (mostly trial & error + horrible loading times when checking compatibility with other mods; the coding itself (once the API is understandable) is not that a big deal) “ducktaping†an old one may cost only a few. Modders are working for free and don’t have unlimited time, so reviving old (tested!!!) plugins has to be preferred compared to not being able to complete a new one at all.

I dont mean to be presumptuous and blind to the effort it takes to make a new plugin. I am very much aware of the immense amount of time and effort. I was simply saying that Roverdude is willing and able then he should definitely go ahead. I know that the root is definitely poor licensing. I defintely tried to phrase my original post as careful as possible as to not arouse suspicion of me being demanding in anyway because I am not. I was just trying to convey my frustration in how stagnant the forums would be if new a amazing modders like roverdude didn't come around and say "listen we can do it better and we should do it better" so I was basically trying to take up the banner of lets make it better as a true supporter and being modder myself lol. I know that its all for free and you guys pay with time and get nothing in return. That is certainly something that gets overlooked as well because there are way too many people on here that demand and feel entitled instead of grateful and constructive. So I don't want to derail this any longer I just want to say again keep doing what you are doing, it is definitely the right direction for this community.

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RoverDude

RoverDude

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I dont mean to be presumptuous and blind to the effort it takes to make a new plugin. I am very much aware of the immense amount of time and effort. I was simply saying that Roverdude is willing and able then he should definitely go ahead. I know that the root is definitely poor licensing. I defintely tried to phrase my original post as careful as possible as to not arouse suspicion of me being demanding in anyway because I am not. I was just trying to convey my frustration in how stagnant the forums would be if new a amazing modders like roverdude didn't come around and say "listen we can do it better and we should do it better" so I was basically trying to take up the banner of lets make it better as a true supporter and being modder myself lol. I know that its all for free and you guys pay with time and get nothing in return. That is certainly something that gets overlooked as well because there are way too many people on here that demand and feel entitled instead of grateful and constructive. So I don't want to derail this any longer I just want to say again keep doing what you are doing, it is definitely the right direction for this community.

No worries at all and thanks :) As long as folks are clear this will be a lot slower than the stuff I normally crank out, and I'll likely mess it up ;)

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marce

marce

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I dont mean to be presumptuous and blind to the effort it takes to make a new plugin. I am very much aware of the immense amount of time and effort. I was simply saying that Roverdude is willing and able then he should definitely go ahead. I know that the root is definitely poor licensing. I defintely tried to phrase my original post as careful as possible as to not arouse suspicion of me being demanding in anyway because I am not. I was just trying to convey my frustration in how stagnant the forums would be if new a amazing modders like roverdude didn't come around and say "listen we can do it better and we should do it better" so I was basically trying to take up the banner of lets make it better as a true supporter and being modder myself lol. I know that its all for free and you guys pay with time and get nothing in return. That is certainly something that gets overlooked as well because there are way too many people on here that demand and feel entitled instead of grateful and constructive. So I don't want to derail this any longer I just want to say again keep doing what you are doing, it is definitely the right direction for this community.

Don't worry man, your post was perfectly fine.

My reply was mostly a general statement where I tried to give an explanation why there is a tendency to continue existing stuff instead of creating something new.

Hope I didn’t give you any bad feelings

And while I [personally!!] don’t like all of Rover’s decisions and will continue to raise a critical voice wrt his over engineering/over thinking (and too much resources) [my personal opinion!!]. I support, value and promote his work and open/community friendly approach!

Don’t be disturbed by my occasional moaning RoverDude, please continue your great work!

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RoverDude

RoverDude

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@RoverDude In the podcast linked in the last DevNotes they mentioned you were working on an alternative to Kerbal Attachment System. Is that correct? If so, does it have a name and/or dev thread yet?

GrabbyStuff - no dev thread till I get more of it done :) Right now I just have stuff follow me around mournfully

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TMarkos

TMarkos

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GrabbyStuff - no dev thread till I get more of it done :) Right now I just have stuff follow me around mournfully
You know, while you're still in concept mode, I've got one word: backpacks. How cool would it be to have a mini size-limited container to pack around 3 or 4 small items?
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forsaken1111

forsaken1111

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That's actually a thing already - Universal Storage's KAS pack has little EVA Fuel backpacks.

Nice, does it have a small amount of KAS storage too? Life support? I haven't looked at universal storage in a while, the parts are a bit too high poly for me.

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TMarkos

TMarkos

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Nice, does it have a small amount of KAS storage too? Life support? I haven't looked at universal storage in a while, the parts are a bit too high poly for me.

Nope, just EVA fuel. I think you're matching thoughts with RoverDude, though, because he's already sort of got the extended EVA thing going on here:

https://i.imgur.com/4m4JcWO.png

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