Ultimate space simulation software

 
A-L-E-X
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Re: Image Dump

11 Jan 2023 04:00

I take it these things can be changed even with the autopilot hold altitude on--
Attack Angle (0.02) (looks like this changes automatically so maybe I shouldn't change this myself)
Sideslip Angle (0.02) but the notation says Autopilot so maybe that can't be changed
Elevator (0.00)
Rudder (0.00)
Ailerons (0.00)
Flaps (0.00)

So using the keyboard shortcuts to alter these should help me turn the ship more smoothly even with the autopilot hold distance on?  Would any new ship I create of the same type or restart of the program cause everything to go back to default values?

Also, how come some of these controls use the same keys?  How would I select which one to use?  For example I see from your settings screenshot two of them use Numpad 6 and Numpad 4 (rudder and ailerons), so how would I select which setting to change if they both use the same keys?  Also can you show the screenshot for the Flaps control, that part got cut off.  And what does + Mouse X and - Mouse Y mean-- is that if I'm using two mice or the XY axis movement of a single mouse (+ Mouse Y moving the mouse up and - Mouse Y moving it down, or + Mouse X moving the mouse right and - Mouse X moving the mouse left? And is this done in conjunction with the keypad or as an alternative?)  Thanks!
Those numbers show the current position of the control surfaces (except sideslip and angle of attack), if using your controls has no effect on them, then the autopilot will likely have full control over them.

As for why there are two different control options for thrusters and control surfaces, I have no idea. When do airplane surface controls take over from thrusters? I have no idea — I imagine when the dynamic pressure is high enough. When is that? I have no idea. Can you use both at the same time? I have no idea, and why would I want to? Even though there is a flaps control, I do not believe any flaps functionality has ever been implemented in SE.

The keys you assign to the controls is a global SE attribute. Any ship you use will use those key controls.  Mouse-X and Mouse-Y refers to the two different axes of one mouse.

You're asking the wrong person about these features, you need to ask one of the programmers. And the most likely answer will be "It's still very much a work-in-progress — didn't you read the warning when you clicked on the "Flight Simulator" button?" Good luck. :)
Such mysteries make it more interesting!
Have you ever used any of these 4 controls?
But if two of the options use the same keypad combos, how does one pick which of the two to use? Or is the choice limited by the dynamic pressure?  So one set of 2 controls will work at a certain dynamic pressure and as soon as the threshold is crossed those same keys will work on the other set of 2 controls instead?
Like rudders and ailerons both use Numpad 6 and 4, how do I get those keys to change rudders one time and ailerons the next time? Is this automatically done based on dynamic pressure or can I physically toggle from one to the other myself?  Has anyone used these controls before?
Also from your screenshot, I see a Key 1 and a Key 2-- does that mean I can program an alternate set of key controls for each ship function? So I could make them 4 different key controls (a different key for each ship function) instead of 2 ships functions being operational with the same key controls?  And this would then universally apply to all ships, of all types?  Thanks!
 
A-L-E-X
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Re: Image Dump

11 Jan 2023 13:40

By the way something weird happened......when I started SE today there was an update and it caused the FOV fonts to become much smaller and it unhid all my graphical menus.  But more importantly, it somehow randomized my playlist (and I don't know how to make the songs play in alphanumerical order like they played before, which is what I want), the playlist now plays randomly.  How do I get them to play in alphanumerical order like it was before? It says the new build is 1040.
 
Mr. Abner
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Re: Image Dump

11 Jan 2023 18:29

Mine still says .45.1940 — no update sine the last time I ran it. And no updates scheduled in Steam for anything.

But mine, too, is borked today. A ship I left in orbit around a moon of a gas giant... well today SE thinks it is "interstellar". The light of the "sun" nor any other body in the system shed light on it, it is totally black as though in deep interstellar space, orbit HUD mode does not come on. And when I orbit the camera around the ship and look at in line with the gas giant, the ship is rendered below the clouds of said gas giant, even though it is thousands of kilometers away.

Well... that's beta software for you... :/
 
A-L-E-X
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Re: Image Dump

11 Jan 2023 18:49

Mine still says .45.1940 — no update sine the last time I ran it. And no updates scheduled in Steam for anything.

But mine, too, is borked today. A ship I left in orbit around a moon of a gas giant... well today SE thinks it is "interstellar". The light of the "sun" nor any other body in the system shed light on it, it is totally black as though in deep interstellar space, orbit HUD mode does not come on. And when I orbit the camera around the ship and look at in line with the gas giant, the ship is rendered below the clouds of said gas giant, even though it is thousands of kilometers away.

Well... that's beta software for you... :/
It may be a windows update-- did you get that too?
I see a huge search bar on my taskbar at the bottom left.

1940 is mine too but it updated automatically anyway.....

It only does that when I do a graphics driver update which I did not do.

So it must be because of the windows update.

How do you orbit a camera lol?

Also question, instead of me leaving my computer on for days, can I turn my computer off while a ship is flying through the sky above a planet (hold altitude on) and turn the computer on again the next day?  Will the ship resume from where it was when I was last using SE or will it jump forward in time to when I use SE again-- let's say it's 12 hours later that I restart the program-- will the ship be 12 hours ahead and behave like it moved on the path it would have moved in anyway had I not turned SE off or will it be in the same position from when I left it when I last used SE?  Do I have to turn SE off manually for this to work?  Because my computer automatically shuts off every night lol.
 
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Re: Image Dump

11 Jan 2023 19:05

Mine still says .45.1940 — no update sine the last time I ran it. And no updates scheduled in Steam for anything.

But mine, too, is borked today. A ship I left in orbit around a moon of a gas giant... well today SE thinks it is "interstellar". The light of the "sun" nor any other body in the system shed light on it, it is totally black as though in deep interstellar space, orbit HUD mode does not come on. And when I orbit the camera around the ship and look at in line with the gas giant, the ship is rendered below the clouds of said gas giant, even though it is thousands of kilometers away.

Well... that's beta software for you... :/
PS how do I unrandomize my music playing list? I want it playing in alphanumeric order, I renamed the files that way long ago, but it went to random play somehow with this new windows update.  Thanks!
 
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Re: Image Dump

11 Jan 2023 23:20

Mine still says .45.1940 — no update sine the last time I ran it. And no updates scheduled in Steam for anything.

But mine, too, is borked today. A ship I left in orbit around a moon of a gas giant... well today SE thinks it is "interstellar". The light of the "sun" nor any other body in the system shed light on it, it is totally black as though in deep interstellar space, orbit HUD mode does not come on. And when I orbit the camera around the ship and look at in line with the gas giant, the ship is rendered below the clouds of said gas giant, even though it is thousands of kilometers away.

Well... that's beta software for you... :/
It may be a windows update-- did you get that too?
I see a huge search bar on my taskbar at the bottom left.

1940 is mine too but it updated automatically anyway.....

It only does that when I do a graphics driver update which I did not do.

So it must be because of the windows update.

How do you orbit a camera lol?

Also question, instead of me leaving my computer on for days, can I turn my computer off while a ship is flying through the sky above a planet (hold altitude on) and turn the computer on again the next day?  Will the ship resume from where it was when I was last using SE or will it jump forward in time to when I use SE again-- let's say it's 12 hours later that I restart the program-- will the ship be 12 hours ahead and behave like it moved on the path it would have moved in anyway had I not turned SE off or will it be in the same position from when I left it when I last used SE?  Do I have to turn SE off manually for this to work?  Because my computer automatically shuts off every night lol.
No more Windows updates for me (at least for the foreseeable future) — still on Windows 7. :)

If the program is not running, no time passes in the SE universe. (You used to be able to set the clock to the current time and date with a single click in .9.8.0, but you had to do that manually every time you ran the program, and I don't remember if it would update the position of ships, just the planets and moons, etc.  Not sure if you can still do that in .9.9.0 — I'm pretty sure you can not do it in the Flight Sim part.

With a Behind or Auto camera, right-click and mouse move orbits the camera about the ship.

No idea about the music player, haven't used it in SE for years, and no idea why Windows update would bork it, but somehow it doesn't surprise me. Windows changed the way it sorts filenames? Wouldn't be the first time.

Sorry... seems like I'm not being much help these days, but you know, click some buttons... see what happens. :)
 
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Re: Image Dump

12 Jan 2023 06:51

Mine still says .45.1940 — no update sine the last time I ran it. And no updates scheduled in Steam for anything.

But mine, too, is borked today. A ship I left in orbit around a moon of a gas giant... well today SE thinks it is "interstellar". The light of the "sun" nor any other body in the system shed light on it, it is totally black as though in deep interstellar space, orbit HUD mode does not come on. And when I orbit the camera around the ship and look at in line with the gas giant, the ship is rendered below the clouds of said gas giant, even though it is thousands of kilometers away.

Well... that's beta software for you... :/
It may be a windows update-- did you get that too?
I see a huge search bar on my taskbar at the bottom left.

1940 is mine too but it updated automatically anyway.....

It only does that when I do a graphics driver update which I did not do.

So it must be because of the windows update.

How do you orbit a camera lol?

Also question, instead of me leaving my computer on for days, can I turn my computer off while a ship is flying through the sky above a planet (hold altitude on) and turn the computer on again the next day?  Will the ship resume from where it was when I was last using SE or will it jump forward in time to when I use SE again-- let's say it's 12 hours later that I restart the program-- will the ship be 12 hours ahead and behave like it moved on the path it would have moved in anyway had I not turned SE off or will it be in the same position from when I left it when I last used SE?  Do I have to turn SE off manually for this to work?  Because my computer automatically shuts off every night lol.
No more Windows updates for me (at least for the foreseeable future) — still on Windows 7. :)

If the program is not running, no time passes in the SE universe. (You used to be able to set the clock to the current time and date with a single click in .9.8.0, but you had to do that manually every time you ran the program, and I don't remember if it would update the position of ships, just the planets and moons, etc.  Not sure if you can still do that in .9.9.0 — I'm pretty sure you can not do it in the Flight Sim part.

With a Behind or Auto camera, right-click and mouse move orbits the camera about the ship.

No idea about the music player, haven't used it in SE for years, and no idea why Windows update would bork it, but somehow it doesn't surprise me. Windows changed the way it sorts filenames? Wouldn't be the first time.

Sorry... seems like I'm not being much help these days, but you know, click some buttons... see what happens. :)
I got it to work, there's a symbol for it in the music player!
The bad part is though I don't think these settings save.  I need to find the .INI file to make the settings stay saved I think.  It changed the volume of the music and the sound effects too.  I need to fix all of that.  I think you're right and especially about the flight sim which is always beyond 2500 AD lol.

But I guess if my computer automatically shuts down without properly closing SE it doesn't save the ship's last location at all? When I restart it the ship no longer exists.  How do you resume SE from your last ship position? Do you have to save it somehow or properly exit SE in some way?

But on a positive side....somehow the program runs more quickly now and uses less memory.  AND the graphics look higher quality I see more stars and nebulae and galaxies (higher dynamic range?) and the ships are much more responsive and get to their destinations quicker.  The fonts look better too-- no idea how a new windows update would do all that lol.
Last edited by A-L-E-X on 12 Jan 2023 07:00, edited 3 times in total.
 
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Re: Image Dump

12 Jan 2023 06:54

Here....note the smaller font in the middle of the screen and all these stars and galaxies I used to have to turn up the exposure to see (even as the "sun" is rising).
scr21549.jpg
 
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Re: Image Dump

12 Jan 2023 06:56

and yes those are my two starships that do really well in autopilot hold altitude mode, the Argon Light Fighter 2 and the Cerberus Vanguard.
 
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Re: Image Dump

13 Jan 2023 06:44

Image
 
Mr. Abner
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Re: Image Dump

13 Jan 2023 20:20

and yes those are my two starships that do really well in autopilot hold altitude mode, the Argon Light Fighter 2 and the Cerberus Vanguard.
Have you tried orbiting an airless world? With no atmosphere, it can be fun seeing how low you can make your orbit without hitting a mountain. :)
990-00549.jpg
990-00550.jpg
Smaller ships are better in this case, smaller hit box, so you can go lower.
990-00553.jpg
 
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Re: Image Dump

14 Jan 2023 04:49

and yes those are my two starships that do really well in autopilot hold altitude mode, the Argon Light Fighter 2 and the Cerberus Vanguard.
Have you tried orbiting an airless world? With no atmosphere, it can be fun seeing how low you can make your orbit without hitting a mountain. :)

990-00549.jpg
990-00550.jpg

Smaller ships are better in this case, smaller hit box, so you can go lower.

990-00553.jpg
oh wow that will be my next target!
is it better if they are completely airless or if there is a very small amount (less than 0.1 atm)? I think it's cool when you can see just  a little atmosphere at the bottom lol.

Also, how do you go into orbit? I just find the setting that keeps the engines running just high enough not to hit the ground again lol.

What's the lowest orbit you can do? With the Cerberus Vanguard the ship would go up to 25 km and then back down to 4 km and then back up again......came close to hitting a couple of mountains in those 10 days but stayed a few km above them without my having to adjust the controls.

The Argon Light Fighter seems to be a little more stable (and prettier to look at too), it slowly went up to 22 km over the course of a day and a half with the same settings and then slowly came down to around 10 km and then back up to 22 km and now back down to around 15 km....that seems to be the stabilization point as the hover engines go down to 0 at that elevation and are up around 20 when it's around or a little over 20 km high.  The magic main engines setting is 3 for both ships anything less than that and they will eventually crash.

That ship might do better with that camera 10 km under it because it stays at a more stable altitude with the same settings.

Is there an "auto" way to go into orbit and what is the altitude of the orbit-- similar to these altitudes I've been getting or higher?
 
A-L-E-X
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Re: Image Dump

14 Jan 2023 04:56

and yes those are my two starships that do really well in autopilot hold altitude mode, the Argon Light Fighter 2 and the Cerberus Vanguard.
Have you tried orbiting an airless world? With no atmosphere, it can be fun seeing how low you can make your orbit without hitting a mountain. :)

990-00549.jpg
990-00550.jpg

Smaller ships are better in this case, smaller hit box, so you can go lower.

990-00553.jpg
What's the size of that ship (and what's it called-- and not on Steam I assume?) and how low can it go?  Do you think I should stick with the Argon Light Fighter ship since 1) it's prettier-- lots of nice colors on the control panel 2) more stable in flight (slightly....the Cerberus Vanguard is really good too, but looks like the stealth bomber with its blacks and dark greys lol) 3) it's smaller-- 1.5 km so it can go down to 750 meters rather than the other ship which is 3.5 km in size so it can't get lower than 1.75 km?  Although that's pretty low too, both are around or less than 1 mile or 5,000 feet or so in altitude!)
 
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Re: Image Dump

14 Jan 2023 06:04

and yes those are my two starships that do really well in autopilot hold altitude mode, the Argon Light Fighter 2 and the Cerberus Vanguard.
Have you tried orbiting an airless world? With no atmosphere, it can be fun seeing how low you can make your orbit without hitting a mountain. :)

990-00549.jpg
990-00550.jpg

Smaller ships are better in this case, smaller hit box, so you can go lower.

990-00553.jpg
What's the size of that ship (and what's it called-- and not on Steam I assume?) and how low can it go?  Do you think I should stick with the Argon Light Fighter ship since 1) it's prettier-- lots of nice colors on the control panel 2) more stable in flight (slightly....the Cerberus Vanguard is really good too, but looks like the stealth bomber with its blacks and dark greys lol) 3) it's smaller-- 1.5 km so it can go down to 750 meters rather than the other ship which is 3.5 km in size so it can't get lower than 1.75 km?  Although that's pretty low too, both are around or less than 1 mile or 5,000 feet or so in altitude!)
It's one of ettore-bilbo's ships, originally made for SE .9.8.0, but still seem to work in .9.9.0. (The one pictured may have been slightly modified by me.) It is listed as being 140m in length. You can find it and many others in his thread here — https://forum.spaceengine.org/viewtopic.php?t=65.

If there's no atmosphere, there's no drag to slow you down. There is a minimum altitude where you can maintain a stable orbit though. Varies with the system. You've never piloted a ship into orbit yet? After all this time? And you call yourself a space jockey... ;)
 
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Re: Image Dump

15 Jan 2023 23:42



Have you tried orbiting an airless world? With no atmosphere, it can be fun seeing how low you can make your orbit without hitting a mountain. :)

990-00549.jpg
990-00550.jpg

Smaller ships are better in this case, smaller hit box, so you can go lower.

990-00553.jpg
What's the size of that ship (and what's it called-- and not on Steam I assume?) and how low can it go?  Do you think I should stick with the Argon Light Fighter ship since 1) it's prettier-- lots of nice colors on the control panel 2) more stable in flight (slightly....the Cerberus Vanguard is really good too, but looks like the stealth bomber with its blacks and dark greys lol) 3) it's smaller-- 1.5 km so it can go down to 750 meters rather than the other ship which is 3.5 km in size so it can't get lower than 1.75 km?  Although that's pretty low too, both are around or less than 1 mile or 5,000 feet or so in altitude!)
It's one of ettore-bilbo's ships, originally made for SE .9.8.0, but still seem to work in .9.9.0. (The one pictured may have been slightly modified by me.) It is listed as being 140m in length. You can find it and many others in his thread here — https://forum.spaceengine.org/viewtopic.php?t=65.

If there's no atmosphere, there's no drag to slow you down. There is a minimum altitude where you can maintain a stable orbit though. Varies with the system. You've never piloted a ship into orbit yet? After all this time? And you call yourself a space jockey... ;)
I go straight from warp drive to landing to flying around lol-- maybe I am in orbit and don't know it? I don't use the orb tab in the ship menu though....I use the Hor tab with those controls.  This ship has been staying level for days, perhaps I'm in orbit under 20km altitude?

Do I have to do anything special to go into orbit or can I do it using the Hor controls too?  How would I know when orbit is attained-- a stable altitude? Is there an auto setting for that lol?

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