General suggestions for SpaceEngine

13 Nov 2016 07:54

Another idea: Add ColorRGB parameter to the atmosphere tag, it will set the color of the atmosphere, because it would be much easier than creating an atmosphere model[DOT] If this paremeter is not written down in the planet code, SE will select a random color, that is not black or white, if possible[DOT]

Example:

Moon "Name"
{
  MassMoon 1.3
  DistKm  140443
  Class "Desert"

  Atmosphere
  {  
        ColorRGB (255 0 0) //Red color
        Pressure 0.45
        Greenhouse 0
  }

Quarior · 13 Nov 2016 11:29

Would be convenient to indicate on the orbit the unpacking, not to be confused with the MeanAnomaly which goes from -360 to 360 degree but I speak in days (after going from minute to years) that could serve for fantastic calendars.
If you do not understand what I say, look here (go in sections moons, it is shift which concerns me, it is in solar days).
Thank to MatsoftwareAtHereToo for having made me discover the site.

MatsoftwareAtHereToo wrote:
Another idea: Add ColorRGB parameter to the atmosphere tag, it will set the color of the atmosphere, because it would be much easier than creating an atmosphere model[DOT] If this paremeter is not written down in the planet code, SE will select a random color, that is not black or white, if possible[DOT]
Example:
Code: Select all
Moon "Name"
{
  MassMoon 1.3
  DistKm  140443
  Class "Desert"
  Atmosphere
  {  
        ColorRGB (255 0 0) //Red color
        Pressure 0.45
        Greenhouse 0
  }

I think you put the atmosphere parameters directly into the code of the planet, it is true that it can be practical to avoid creating new models and have fun having the right color by saturation and hue. Since in the code the colors range from 0 to 1, so keep it there too, just divided the value by 255 (1 0 0).

ARBB · 04 Dec 2016 06:59

I imagine a good procedural text system, where all the object information is smartly described through a set of varied phrases wich give important information. Well, here's a code. Adjus[size=85]t i[size=85][font=monospace]t.[/font][/size][/size]

//Object name 
} 
 'Object name' is an 'object type' wich is 'object age', and locates itself on 'galaxy name'. It is made of 'object composition', and has 
'object number of sattelites' (planets or moons).
 It is 'object diameter' or 'object circumference',wich is an 'object size magnitude' (small, medium, large, colossal), making it 
'object rarity' (Common, uncommon, rare).
}
//Exclusive for planets
 'Planet name' also has an 'planet ESI percentage', and a 'planet ocean comoposition'.
}
//Exclusive for asteroids
 'Asteroid name' is an asteroid orbiting 'star name' in the 'galaxy name' galaxy. It weights 'asteroid mass in kgs', and is composite of 
'asteroid composition percentages'. It is 'asteroid age' and orbits it's parent star every 'orbital period' years.
 It's orbit has an inclination of 'asteroid orbit inclination', and a semimajor axis of 'asteroid semimajor axis'.
//End

Quarior · 06 Dec 2016 02:12

I have an idea but that seems stupid because it is not really realistic but at least for modded objects.
It's about choosing the shape of the object (stars, planets,...), the atmosphere, the clouds and the level of the ocean, by default if you put nothing, it's a sphere. After it just needs to be specified if we want another form this :

<Object> "<Object name>"
{
 Form "<Form type>" //"Sphere", "Cube", "Torus", "Halo",...
}

I think the cube will be the easiest because I assume it's a cube turning into a sphere since it uses the cubemap ?
For others even if they are not default, why not add a folder models/forms so that we can modders.
Then in Space Engine, when exporting the textures of the objects, add a function so that the bump map is transformed to obtain the same result if the shape was a sphere. Here is what I mean with a "flat texture" for a flat cube :

: In input and output if the options isn't checked; 0_0_0.png (388 Bytes) Viewed 5563 times

: In output if the option is checked; 0_0_0.png (20.67 KiB) Viewed 5563 times

07 Dec 2016 13:45

MatsoftwareAtHereToo wrote:
Source of the post Another idea: Add ColorRGB parameter to the atmosphere tag, it will set the color of the atmosphere, because it would be much easier than creating an atmosphere model

It's impossible. Atmospheres are not coloured by a simple RGB value, they are modelling light scattering. The only possible way to "repaint" the atmosphere is changing the result image, for example with a conversion in HSV color space.

Quarior wrote:
Source of the post If you do not understand what I say

Indeed, don't understand. Do you mean indication of the lunar phase?

ARBB wrote:
Source of the post I imagine a good procedural text system, where all the object information is smartly described through a set of varied phrases wich give important information.

It can look rather simple in English, but think about other languages. Making generated sentence correct grammatically in Russian is a programming nightmare. Russian has 7 cases and 3 genders of nouns, 6 conjugation of verbs, and other cool stuff. All these things changes the suffix of a word, requires particles for agreement of different word in the sentence, etc. With some effort I can implement this for Russian, and maybe for English, but I am not familiar with other languages.

Quarior wrote:
Source of the post I have an idea but that seems stupid because it is not really realistic but at least for modded objects.
It's about choosing the shape of the object (stars, planets,...), the atmosphere, the clouds and the level of the ocean, by default if you put nothing, it's a sphere. After it just needs to be specified if we want another form this :

Impossible again. Atmospheric scattering code is designed for a sphere. It is not easy to adapt it for other shapes, many optimizations must be skipped, and entire code rewritten because of this. Too much effort for just few strange mods. The only shape which I probably will implement is a ring (ringworld).

ARBB · 07 Dec 2016 15:15

SpaceEngineer wrote:
ARBB wrote:
Source of the post I imagine a good procedural text system, where all the object information is smartly described through a set of varied phrases wich give important information.

It can look rather simple in English, but think about other languages. Making generated sentence correct grammatically in Russian is a programming nightmare. Russian has 7 cases and 3 genders of nouns, 6 conjugation of verbs, and other cool stuff. All these things changes the suffix of a word, requires particles for agreement of different word in the sentence, etc. With some effort I can implement this for Russian, and maybe for English, but I am not familiar with other languages.

M8, that's because you don't know portuguese.

3 genders of nouns. (He/she/it) with variation as in time, number, agreement with the determiners, and a lot of rules when talking about augmentatives and diminutives.
Verbs are conjugated based on (1,2 and 3) person, (singular/plural) number, mode (Imperative/Subjuntive/Indicative), and 3 different times with 5 different sub-times.
Classification of words based on their main silabes.
3 different cases, wich one with 3 different purposes.
Other cool stuff.
So you aren't the only one with a problem. If everyone colaborate, we can surpass the language challenge, just like americans did with native americans. Oh god.

YouTube · 07 Dec 2016 16:06

SpaceEngineer wrote:
MatsoftwareAtHereToo wrote:
Source of the post Another idea: Add ColorRGB parameter to the atmosphere tag, it will set the color of the atmosphere, because it would be much easier than creating an atmosphere model

It's impossible. Atmospheres are not coloured by a simple RGB value, they are modelling light scattering. The only possible way to "repaint" the atmosphere is changing the result image, for example with a conversion in HSV color space.

It is worth mentioning that HSV modification of atmospheres is already implemented, using the Hue and Saturation parameters in the atmosphere tag. You can use the planet editor in-engine to find the values you want.

SpaceEngineer wrote:
ARBB wrote:
Source of the post I imagine a good procedural text system, where all the object information is smartly described through a set of varied phrases wich give important information.

It can look rather simple in English, but think about other languages. Making generated sentence correct grammatically in Russian is a programming nightmare. Russian has 7 cases and 3 genders of nouns, 6 conjugation of verbs, and other cool stuff. All these things changes the suffix of a word, requires particles for agreement of different word in the sentence, etc. With some effort I can implement this for Russian, and maybe for English, but I am not familiar with other languages.

This should be fairly simple to implement (though tedious to code). It could be handled as a community project if the script defining what text should be generated could be put into locale config files. Then the only thing the engine itself would need would be a script parser and to pre-define some user-friendly variables and constants to be used by the script.

07 Dec 2016 16:46

I compiled an Italian morphemes table for a Pocketbook Italian dictionary, so I definitely agree with HarbingerDawn regarding the tediousness, but I guess it could be explored. Another thing to add to the list, SpaceEngineer

Quarior · 08 Dec 2016 02:22

SpaceEngineer wrote:
Source of the post
Quarior wrote:
Source of the post If you do not understand what I say

Indeed, don't understand. Do you mean indication of the lunar phase?

The answer is yes (although I think it is in relation to the solar day) but also a calendar of the planet. I managed to do it through a Python program for my calendar with putting the phases of the moons (see here (French)) so I think it is possible to do it to others. Only disadvantage, the time (0 second) begins the first of January 1970. Otherwise one must make a beautiful addition of today in seconds minus 01/01/1970 in seconds (62125920000).
In Python :

import time
t=time.time()
t=t+(1970*3600*24*365)

So year 0 exists so be careful.

SpaceEngineer wrote:
Source of the post
Quarior wrote:
Source of the post I have an idea but that seems stupid because it is not really realistic but at least for modded objects.
It's about choosing the shape of the object (stars, planets,...), the atmosphere, the clouds and the level of the ocean, by default if you put nothing, it's a sphere. After it just needs to be specified if we want another form this :

Impossible again. Atmospheric scattering code is designed for a sphere. It is not easy to adapt it for other shapes, many optimizations must be skipped, and entire code rewritten because of this. Too much effort for just few strange mods. The only shape which I probably will implement is a ring (ringworld).

I would have thought that it would be towards the last ones implemented because I think that this type of model that makes almost 3 in 1 (ring, torus, halo) is the most complicated, must "pierced the sphere" Not see how the gravity would work in Space Engine. On one side one is drawn towards the center of the mass of the object on the surface furthest from the center of gravity and on the other to the surface closest to the center of gravity by the centrifugal force.

: Ring's schematic; Ring schematic.png (24.78 KiB) Viewed 5516 times

Otherwise, very interesting.

08 Dec 2016 07:33

SpaceEngineer wrote:
Source of the post It's impossible.

Uhh, I did not think this is impossible[DOT]

YouTube · 08 Dec 2016 12:48

MatsoftwareAtHereToo wrote:
SpaceEngineer wrote:
Source of the post It's impossible.

Uhh, I did not think this is impossible[DOT]

It is impossible with the atmosphere model used by SE. It could be possible to make some model which produced good results AND allowed defining simply by giving a single color value, but it would require writing all new code for the atmosphere model. It hardly seems worth it just to save a few modders 1 minute of time from having to go into SE and choose a hue shift value and saturation value to apply to a specific model.

jadestar · 08 Dec 2016 20:40

Just curious, I was wondering with the new Celestia-ish scripting feature it might be possible to have an intro script kinda of like Celestia had? I was thinking a simulation of Yuri Gagarin's famous flight in Vostok 1 might be really cool!

It would also probably get Space Engine some extra publicity every year around the world space parties organized on the date of Gagarin's flight known as Yuri's Night. Yuri's Night has been growing in popularity each year.

Barring that will it be possible to execute a script on start up at all?

08 Dec 2016 21:53

Would it be possible to have several Surface layers? So far, I create many of my add-ons with cloud layers.

For example, these are all cloud layers, except for the top layer.

And the surface layers must of course be rendered from the inside.

Just like the cloud layers here.

(The landscape are clouds.)

08 Dec 2016 22:41

jadestar wrote:
Source of the post Just curious, I was wondering with the new Celestia-ish scripting feature it might be possible to have an intro script kinda of like Celestia had?

Type in the console: 'run example'
The script is in the data/scripts/, but it has much less capabilities than the new system.

jadestar wrote:
Source of the post Barring that will it be possible to execute a script on start up at all?

The new version will have ability to run a script passed through a command line. So you may make a .bat file or edit SE shortcut. This also means that you can associate SpaceEngine.exe with the script file extension and "run scripts" by double-clicking on them.

JackDole wrote:
Source of the post Would it be possible to have several Surface layers? So far, I create many of my add-ons with cloud layers.

Yes, it's possible. I plan to make an ice layers/floating ice caps using two additional "surface" layers floating in the ocean.

Quarior · 09 Dec 2016 01:50

SpaceEngineer wrote:
Source of the post Yes, it's possible. I plan to make an ice layers/floating ice caps using two additional "surface" layers floating in the ocean.

Very interesting. Can we also make floating islands (even if I think unrealistic but can be artificial) ?

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