@11qazxc lol If it makes you feel any better, I can indeed claim that I upvoted it for the actual creation OF the image (the 'tech'), and not the image subject! Though, I do suspect you're right... :P
(srsly, too, I have no idea who that is, as the only anime I've really ever gotten into was Ghost in the Shell, specifically the GiG series.)
Yea, what's the challenge exactly? <_>
IA, or AI?
If AI, then Artificial Intelligence? Sounds difficult to pull off in SP heh
Or "Anti-Insurgency"? Granted, I don't know what that might entail, but it seems easier, at least for me... lol
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If "IA", then uh... I have no guesses what it could be... :}
EDIT: Oooh, you mean modify one of the default files in the AircraftDesigns folder, such as __aiEscortEnemy__.xml or __aiOpponentRacecar__.xml?
@Something5353 [Note: This post is entirely predicated on the notion that you play on a PC or Mac.] Depending on your computer's graphic's chip maker is (AMD, nVidia, or Intel are who make the actual chips), you can probably create a game profile for SP and limit its framerate (FPS) that way.
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I know AMD can, at least on Windows, though it might take further behind-the-scenes tweaking to accomplish it, since it's profile only lets me set the framerate to a minimum of 30FPS (and editing the file all of these profiles is stored in, is a bit of a task, which even then whether or not it abides by setting it to "18" is an unknown!)
However... As I typed that, there MIGHT be another way.... I don't know how likely it is to work, though.
If you go in and edit your Settings file in notepad, which is in the folder that has the "AircraftDesigns" folder (also the Mods folder if you have any installed), you can tell it what framerate to run at (... in theory, if it works that way).
Mine for example is: targetFramerate="65"
You'd want to set it to: targetFramerate="18"
Save the file and load up SP then. (Technically, I suspect Android will have a similar "Settings.xml" and have the same data in it, since mine on Windows has Phone related settings, like Gyro sensor and Touch Controls)*
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Technically there's other methods to try and you can do it from the same settings file, It requires changing the Refresh Rate to 18 (the number in "Resolution" following the @ symbol; ie mine is 65Hz as defined by "1920x1080@65") and then setting "VSyncEnabled" to True. That too, should force --in theory at least heh-- the game to run at 18FPS. But even then, I am even less confident it'd acciomplish what we want! The other would be using something like "ReShade", which I imagine would have a similar framerate limiting ability... But I digress... Getting ahead of myself!
Try that out first heh If ypu need help let me know.
Smol Airport needs a Smol Plane!
Although, that might actually be much smaller than what I made... I know I had issues scaling it down that small, so I have no idea if going even smaller scale would continue to 'function' with Unity's Physics engine.
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That being said, I am willing to try 1/4-scaling my 1/4 scale, if you want? lol
ahahah Here I am, thinking "Hey! I can reduce the parts on this thing by like 200 or more!!"
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So I replace those ~25 parts-per-hub wheel outer-rings, with a single Hollow Fuselage of the correct size. Did just the back idler wheels first (whatever they're called, opposite of the sprocketed drive wheel). Get those two done (4 rings total), part count is down to 1026, nnnoice! "I'll go test it now, see how it goes..."
..... -_- Thanks, Jundroo, for making the defaults-to-curved-shape Fuselage have a -SQUARE- hitbox/collision box!!! *sigh*
I mean, it works fine, doesn't technically impede anything mechanically that I can tell, but VISUALLY... That's another story. Visually it is such a facepalm moment, as the tracks pass over those in a derpy square pattern overtop the round ("circular") fuselage part.... T_T
Teh Moar U Kno! _,-`*
At least I only burned 30mins on it :P
:O I'm with @jaynnie071621 on this... how is there only so few pieces?! lol I feel like it'd take me 200 just to make the amazing lighting that you pulled off, @Sayboye12!!
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Seriously, that night shot is very inspiring!
:thinking:
*I bet he made the beacons wide so that 1 could replace 4 or 5* ...downloads build to not only admire...................but unlock its secreetttsss...
EDIT: *blinks* W..what the what...?! lmao
It doesn't use beacons to make those bits glow... <_0
Not sure I've unlocked any secrets yet, just more impressed bewilderment. Either it has beacons and you'e scaled them to be invisibru, or Glass Fuselage at certain size and color/transparency, just.... somehow emits light at night??? *scratches head*
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I've always liked my ability to think outside the box and make something look like something else, or use this to enhance that, but, damn. You are on a whole other level and I have MUCH to learn/figure out!!! o_o
What exactly is "unstable" about it? (Besides when toggling Auto Pilot)
For me, it flies better than the majority. There was a slight wobble during take-off, but after that only minimal automatic roll with a little bit of pitch-up while in flight. Both of which are lower than a lot of the planes I make, which I then have a lot of tweaking to do afterwards lol
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BTW out of curiosity, what was your intention with that Rotator in the back? It's only connected to the Fuselage around the engine, and wouldn't do anything from what I can tell... If you were trying to add Thrust Vectoring for the engine, I can try to add that for ya.
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EDIT: Aah ok, I think I see where you're coming from now... At insanely high speeds, under "constant-input-control" (aka, Mouse, or a touchscreen in your case), it gets a horrible case of the Speed-Wobbles. Particularly when in lower altitudes with denser atmosphere.
The real solution, there, is simple: Don't use such an absurd Throttle setting as "sum(Throttle*9+sum(0)" lol
I don't quite see the purpose of it anyhow, besides......... I assume..... giving infinite "Max" throttle, and thus unlimited speed. The downside I'm seeing, is when used on a jet-engine, it's not allowing you to throttle down, and leaves you stuck at max-throttle.
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I removed all the fuel (and Deadweight) from the body panels, restored their Scale to 1, and added a "Fuel Tank" block, then modified its capacity to 3x what you had, changed its Mass scale to be the same as what it had been... and now it can fly much much longer! :P (I also added rear landing gear, but that was mostly so I could take off trouble free.)
@Hedero
Hed Solo: "She'll make point-five past lightspeed. She may not look like much, but she's got it where it counts, kid. I've added some special modifications myself."
. shrug This seemed quite fitting, given the context!
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As to not spam, I'll just edit this comment with my observations...
1. At 1% throttle, the engine audibly spooled up 'normally', albeit very slow. HOWEVER, after leveling the craft out, I increased it to 100% and... then the engine's audio seemed to imply it was spooling /down/? Poor SP, its probably thinking "How to do sound for engines with power set at 1E+08?!?" :P
2. Warp-drive, indeed! From 0 to Max Speed instantly, even at... well lets call "1% Throttle" Warp-1?? heh
3. It did eventually level out and stop spinning, whether that something it manages to do on its own, or if my countering it with the opposite roll/yaw inputs had any impact... I dunno.
4. You mentioned the clouds. While in flight I noticed... that is besides the obvious fact that they are zipping by ""Fast AF""... is even their texturing is LITERALLY getting warped! haha
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/765012057807781888/853692186867531806/unknown.png
5. My guess is that speed is a hard limit (sadly only 0.11183264285 of lightspeed) and is due to SP never being ported over to 64bit Unity...?
At least on Windows that is. As my understanding was all MacOS/iOS software was required to be 64bit as of ~2yrs ago, so I imagine that means yours isn't 32bit. If that's the case, is your max speed higher than what I achieved?
@KalubMcCoy Crap, there IS a name for this sort of thing.... clickety-clack
Google says it's "Biomimicry" (Biomimetics), and although that wasn't the word I had in mind, I'm not going to dispute the definition of a word but assume that whatever I had in mind wasn't correct anyhow :P
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biomimetics
(I believe the ME-262 qualifies as an example, being that its body was inspired by the shape of a shark; which one specifically it was, I cannot recall, unfortunately)
""some type of watercraft""
Yea, that definitely is accurate, given it's a Gator/Croc! hahah
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Looks good though, and I approve of such crazy thinking! :P
@Mixx @TheFlyingPiano @titandeathgripper123 Looks like you can make it less fragile by fixing a lot of the part's Connections. Running "AutoConnect" on quite a lot of them will increase their connections considerably. HOWEVER, it's hard to say which ones to use it on is tough to say (though just about everything on each engine nacelle will benefit greatly from doing this), because doing it on some actually causes it to lose some connection points, others to lose LOTS of them, and others to lose important ones that cause them to cease being part of the craft! lol
Ones NOT to do it to: All of the Air Brakes, the very middle part of 'ornamental belt' under the orange "glass" (causes the entire 'belt' to disconnect from the craft).
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One example of "Things to Do or Not Do": was that on the three-engine circular "shoulder" assemblies at the left and right corners... where you start and finish is REALLY tricky. Because when you AutoConnect some, after others, they'll lose a lot of their connections.
Like, the actual 3 jet engines you see sticking out you should do the AutoConnect on them LAST. I did the three big silver rings first, then the gray curved blocks after (but NOT the last one on the very top!), then the 3 engine cowlings, and finally the 3 engines inside (hard to click on some stuff, so be careful).
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I'd upload mine, but unfortunately it seems that since not all of the Connections get Mirrored along with their parts, it means that doing the exact same stuff between both sides yielded something that was different. As such, the craft developed a bad yaw-right pull and so it wouldn't be right (I felt) to share it since the original flew straight.
@RamboJutter Do we have any idea why it uses a V-12, despite having what appears to be some sort of thruster at the back? That's what I found to be the most curious aspect of the artwork :P
Consider this my upvote, since I lack the 30-points requirement :)
Updated planes (via XML) will have their name include a Mk. modifier to function as a "version" system. Updates with lots of changes will receive a full number increment (ie Mk.II, Mk.III ... Mk.IX); minor changes (like bug fixes or label typos) will simply append a lowercase letter (ie Mk.IVa, Mk.IVb ... Mk.IVm)
Mk.II
Addressed a large change in Drag Points getting re-calculated that wasn't noticed before the original upload. (caused from removal of unattached 'spare parts' laying around in the designer; weird system is weird...); Top speed has increased to 572mph, up from ~566mph.
Removal of a Sphere in the left gear opening that I forgot to delete :}
Fixed an itty-bitty bug in my Low Fuel Warning causing the mighty big issue of... it not displaying at ALL. (whoops!)
Tweaked the PREV and NEXT Targets buttons back to where I had them originally.
Changed multiple Instrument Cluster Labels' font to Roboto, to match the other labels that were using it. (with the exception of Roll/Slip and the Clock, which remain Military, to preserve formatting)
Addition of a small Digital Display in the empty space under the "Throttle" gauge, which contains:
---Altitude - This will also readout based on whether the "Metric" button is toggled!
---Mach
---Gs
---RPM(a numerical display for RPM makes it easier to throttle back for fuel economy, but maintain max speed)
Added the Selectable Altitude readout from the digital display, to also switch the actual Altitude gauge; Default is Feet, "Metric" button converts to Meters (hurray for recycling of code!)
---Decided to change the color on the text for Altitude, to match the others (material is now 14,6,6 instead of 18,6,6)
---The [FEET] will change to read [METERS] when the Metric button is toggled
Fixed the Clock's Numbers label being too far away from the gauge face.
Fixed Rate of Climb gauge placement
Micro-adjustments to most of the gauges for symmetry
Changed Button color to be darker (fixes over-bright when selected)
---Also changed the Tooltips on Metric and Knots, from "Airspeed: ", to " Readouts", as those (well, Metric) now also modify other displays.
---And added some Transparency to all the Tooltips, to make them less visually intrusive. (If anyone feels their text should also get made smaller, let me know.)
Removed a superfluous fuselage part from the instrument panel
---Moved the Attachment Point of the "Retract Gear" warning label from that part, to the dash cowling
Changed color of Cockpit's "dash" and a piece of Fuselage under the point of the Canopy from the Silver, to the Midnight Blue
Tweaked <cspace> on the two invisible Warning labels, to help make them easier to read.
Minor: rotated the unused "Tsunami" label around so that it can be read from the "2D" images on the page (assuming they update when a new XML is uploaded)
@SilverStar It's only 2ft shorter than a P-51 :) (32.25' vs 29.6')
It's an optical illusion caused by moving the cockpit so far back.
However, I agree, it looks "off", as you described. I probably would've tapered its tail more, but with being limited by a fixed-dimension cockpit part (ie, can't make the front and back widths different sizes), I had to make due with how it is. Although, looking at that top-down image, I could possibly trim the pieces just behind the cockpit and in front of the tail. But I don't think it'd really help make it look any longer from the side.
Also *le gasp* Thanks to everyone for the spotlights (sorry @Clutch I had meant to thank you earlier!), AND even by Mr... mm I'll avoid a SouthPark reference... AndrewGarrison! <3 And it meeting the standards to get Curated makes me happy, as that was a personal goal I thought I'd miss out on! :D EDIT: Although, I'd forgotten that updating the XML would require it to be RE-curated. At least I saw it had been! heh
Updated XML with lots of changes: bug fixes, tweaks, and new instrumentation functionality.
I'll move that list to a stickied comment to act as the Change Log post for that specific update, including the updated name that the plane with those changes has, so anyone who already downloaded it at some other point, can reference the name to know which one they have. (Will use the Mk. system instead of version; this being Mk.II, whereas the original release lacked that.) EDIT: I'm not sure if the new plane is available through the main Download button, or if it's what's in the XML History? The 2D images do not appear to be based on the new XML though, as the Tsunami label still faces the other direction.
I corrected some drag that I didn't know had cropped up after my removal of "spare parts" I had laying around my designer. That, plus 9-bladed propeller @ 35,000FT = Mach 1.00 in level flight :) (35,188ft @ 668mph)
I was incrementally going up altitude levels, which combined with having no speed loss, was slowly lowering the Speed of Sound (thereby, increasing my Mach), and I finally ticked over 1.0..... with 1% fuel left :P
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While I AM going to be updating the XML shortly, the 9-blade will be absent.
However, the corrected Drag points will be included. As well as:
- Removal of a Sphere in the left gear well that I forgot to delete
- Fixed an itty-bitty bug in my Low Fuel Warning causing the mighty big issue of... it not displaying at ALL. (whoops!)
- Tweaked the PREV and NEXT Targets buttons back to where I had them originally.
- Changed a number of Labels' font on the Instrument Cluster to Roboto, to match the other labels that were using it. (with the exception of Roll/Slip and the Clock, which remain Military, to preserve formatting)
- Decided to change the color on the text for Altitude, to match the rest (material is now 14,6,6 instead of 18,6,6)
- Addition of a small Digital Display in the empty space under the "Throttle" gauge, which contains:
---- Altitude - This will also readout based on whether the "Metric" button is toggled!
---- Mach
---- Gs
---- RPM (a numerical display for RPM makes it easier to throttle back for fuel economy, but maintain max speed)
- Also added the Selectable Altitude readout from the digital display, to also switch the actual Altitude gauge; Defaults to Feet, "Metric" button converts to Meters (hurray for recycling of code!)
- Fixed the Clock's Numbers label being too far away from the gauge face.
- Fixed Rate of Climb gauge placement
- Micro-adjustments to most of the gauges for symmetry
- Changed Button color to be darker (fixes over-bright when selected)
---- Also changed the Tooltips on Metric and Knots, from "Airspeed: " to " Readouts", as now those (well, Metric) also applies to other displays.
---- And added some Transparency to all the Tooltips, to make them less visually intrusive. (If anyone feels their text should also get made smaller, let me know.)
- Removed a superfluous fuselage part from the cockpit
---- Moved the Attachment Point of the "Retract Gear" warning label from that part, to the dash cowling
- Changed color of Cockpit's "dash" and a piece of Fuselage under the point of the Canopy from the Silver, to the Midnight Blue
- Tweaked <cspace> on the two invisible Warning labels, to help make them easier to read.
- Minor: spun the unused "Tsunami" label around so that it can be read from the "2D" images on the page (assuming they update when a new XML is uploaded)
edit: added additional entries to the Change Log
_edit2: sorry for epic delay in getting the XML uploaded; was under the weather yesterday.
@ChiChiWerx Just to clarify, as there seemed to be a misunderstanding :}
Yes, lower altitude and thus higher air density is better for engine power output.
I suspect the mixup was in regard to where I said the "higher DA, the better", in which I only meant the calculated "DA" value that was being referenced for drag racing. Which even then, I could've mis-remembered. (and is quite likely!)
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Either way, I didn't mean to convey that a "higher altitude" was better. :P Sorry for that confusion.
I'm going to hide my one huge embarassment down in here... lol
The Elevators racing-stripes, took me quite a bit to get them anal-retentively-perfect... only to have the damn things somehow not match the movements of the Wing Elevators they've wrapped overtop of!!! >_<
Just.... just please don't look at it! hahah You should be enjoying the flight from inside the cockpit anyhow! :}
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If anyone knows how to fix that though, I'm not above accepting the help!
@ChiChiWerx Thanks for clarifying, AND, for divising that formula for us! :D
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Having no idea what the values were, I started doing what I do, and just mucking with it further. Comparing back and forth between that NASA Calculator and the values my modifications were generating.
Again, I didn't know until just now, what it was all about, but I was coming here to follow up to say that I had managed to fine tune it further. Though, I only tested it at 33,000ft and 1,019ft: TAS/(341-clamp((Altitude*0.0041437),0,43))
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However, at those two altitudes, it's:
@ 33,000ft - within a few-ten-thousandths off. (NASA Calc only returns to the thousandths 0.734, to my 0.7339)
@ 1,019ft - it's only roughly 2-thousandths off; 0.735 calced vs my 0.7339
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I assume that the one oddity I noticed while changing the "per meter of altitude" number, was that up at 33,000ft, anything over 0.0042 (regardless of the initial divisor used) resulted in the same output value.... However, as I check now while it's paused at 1,019ft, all of those readings are now.
Am I correct in my presumption that the reasons is due to the "correction" was running into your imposed clamped maximum of 43?
In the end I think I see where a lot of my initial issue with wrapping my head around it all, was coming from...
I was erroneously pairing temperature with air density on account that at Sea Level, temperature DOES impact air density. A couple decades back I remember some folk who frequent the drag strip, mentioning "DA" (Density Altitude), and that it was was (somehow) determined based on the altitude the track was at, and the air temp of that day. If I recall correctly, the higher the DA the, better, since it meant denser air, which for them meant they could run inject more fuel (they were all easily able to change the programming on their ECU).
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Fast forward to now, and while I'm sure that temperature is a factor, it no doubt is trivial in comparison to the altitude. Where the amount of atmosphere above that's weighing down is substantially less, causing less compression and thus a thinner atmosphere. (to put it crudely, as is all I'm capable of! lmao)
@edensk Well, bummer. Do we know why Jundroo didn't opt to have TAS factor in altitude (density)?
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Also, out of curiosity, why does one want to use 340 instead of 343? Is it because of the inherent rounding error SP is prone to, where 340 accounts for that?
Or even a simpler reason: it's easier to remember and still "close enough"? lol
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Either way, thank you for that! And for the fact that you've always been a great help to anyone with coding question :D
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EDIT: Oh and then safe to assume that just removing /340 in order to have it output the Altitude-Adjusted-TAS speed?
@marcox43 My problem is that if it IS True Air Speed, that only makes it far more likely to be a Bug, since for True Air Speed (emphasis mine):
The true airspeed is the speed that the aircraft travels relative to the air mass in which it is flying. The true airspeed is equal to the ground speed in cases where there is no wind, and is used mostly for flight planning and when quoting aircraft performance specifications. True airspeed can be calculated from either the equivalent airspeed, or the Mach number if the outside air temperature (OAT) is known.
(source: AeroToolbox)
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Worthy of note is that the middle part, is definitely true with SP. GS == TAS when Wind is disabled.
Or is that Jundroo's intention for TAS in Simple Planes... that its sole function is to provide an accurate speed when, and ONLY when, the player has Wind enabled??
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I was always under the assumption that it'd be tied to air density on account of the fact that clearly there is SOME density modeling included, since we experience it when passing through certain altitudes...
Around 11,000ft is the first density change I'm aware of.
Another I believe around 25,000ft
I think one around 39,000ft
I've not spend enough time in the 45,000-80,000 range
Pretty sure there's also one somewhere between 91,000-110,000ft
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That 11,000ft one is the more easily experienced density, particularly in jet powered craft, and especially if it's a faster plane.
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Actually! It just dawned on me that the density is modeled MORE than just in that way!
In my current build, which is a Piston Prop, I have the engine RPM-Limited to 3200RPM [maxRpm at 3232]. It's power output is 3500HP, and that's unfortunately way more than needed for SP's physics, for my build (modeled after a Race plane), as just about anything >75% throttle at low altitudes is wasted since its already at Max RPM.
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At 40,000ft, I can throttle down to about 18%, still achieving Max RPM and therefore suffer no performance loss. At various altitudes I have to use different throttle levels to balance that out, but the benefit of doing so is fuel economy -- legitimate in game economy, not just speaking to real life aircraft performance.
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My point summarized in a question: if density is modeled to the degree that it is... why wouldn't they be utilizing it with TAS? 🤔
Decided to make a second comment since I was about to run out of space in that one:
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My tips:
Don't rely on using "Undo" (CTRL+Z on PC; the icon in the bottom left of the screen), becauase a LOT of the things you do in game are not "logged" like they should be and using Undo actually makes you permanently lose progress. I wish they'd address that, but... it's been ages. Use "Save" instead (CTRL+S). In the learning stages, it's fine to use, but once you start working with Text Labels and Override menu, that's when you want to avoid using it very often.
After you place a Primary Wing, select it, then open up the Override menu (bottom right, next to Play), and where it says Wing-3, change it to Wing-2. That makes it non-flexible (aka 'strong') like the "Structural Wing" but able to have control surfaces like the Primary Wing. If you're making a build that the main wing is made up of Primary Wing and Structural Wing parts, that flexibility is a nightmare, (Confusing I know, but trust me lol)
When it comes to wings, you want the big wings that make the plane fly to either have a "Semi-Symmetric" or "Flat Bottom" airfoil. For the tail fins, you want them to be "Symmetrical". Try to avoid using Symmetrical except for the tail fins (or "canards", which are on the nose).
A crude rule of thumb for the "Center of" Thrust, Mass, Lift (aka CoT-yellow, CoM-red, CoL-blue for spheres in the designer): Keep the CoM between the CoT and CoL; but closer to the CoL. There are exceptions, but that will get you started. When in doubt, look at how other people have balanced that out. (If theirs strays drastically from that, they might be employing Funky Trees magic)
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Good luck, and may the Force (of Lift overcoming Gravity) be with you.
Everything has been summed up pretty well. My suggestion is, if you're not already a coder, to worry about learning or creating complex Funky Tree controlled vehicles LAST.
You can manage to accomplish a lot of stuff simply by knowing the "IF ? THAN : ELSE" statement.
Granted, you need to know the various different input names/values in order to make that statement "work", but you'd be surprised how easy things are with just that lol
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Seriously, I can sort of read code snippets enough to follow along, but I'm a certifiable Coding Moron at the end of the day. Just knowing that single thing has let me accomplish some useful stuff (sadly I have no on-hand example for ya, wish I did).
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Instead, focus on how to use the game interface, and the "quirks" of the system (there are a LOT of quirks unfortunately). Then familiarize yourself with the parts, their individual good and bad attributes. Next work on getting a handle on creating a simple, but functional plane -- by that I mean that it flies well with minimal effort, and doesn't want to enter into a death-spiral when maneuvering (in other words: the fine balancing act between Center of Lift, Center of Mass, and Center of Thrust).
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Once you have it so you know those "basic" things involved to make a functional plane, learn how to manipulate the Fuselage part to make it look interesting ways, so that you can use it to create the curves your need.
Making "complex" looking builds will bring the challenge of your planes now not wanting to fly right, which will lead you to "XML Modding"; also know as "using the Override menu". As you'll need to turn off or decrease the amount of Drag parts make (as the game is nowhere near perfect in modeling airflow once you start making complex stuff), or lower the mass of others, even make others not physically interact with your plane so that they work as designed (ie landing gear).
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By THEN you'll be at a point where you'll want to learn the Funky Trees coding. (It's called "Funky Trees" because it's a language special to Simple PLanes which when created, was used to make the Palm Trees react as you got closer, which looks rather.... funky in their behavior)
@parkrangerjerry God that's hilarious, only because it certainly feels that way every...damn...time... ahahah
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LIGHTBULB!!
That's the next Mod we need!
Anytime the user invokes an action, be it applying a setting to a label, or using Override, or Fine Tuner (mod), the mod will then Add a part (randomly, far from your build) and delete it. (or, invoke two Nudges: one in any direction and the other in the opposite direction.) WHY? Because that does cause the game to write an event to the Undo History, allowing you to actually use it for what it was meant for ;) (I try to make a point of doing that before doing something major that I fear will have undesirable consequences, just so I can use CTR+Z)
UNFORESEEN BONUS!!
This just saved me a bit of time having to re-make something in a Label, due to using "Undo" and having forgotten that just about NOTHING gets applied to the Undo History now. As a result, using "Undo" not only rolled back all the work done in that label... but a ton more work done in ANOTHER label! T_T
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Was able to pop into that backup folder, then simply copy over the most recent Backup from there over into the AircraftDesigns folder, and load that "backup########" build! :D
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Literally The gift that keeps on giving...
*nods* The S in "hpgbproductions" stands for Santa
@MrGreen No problem and you're welcome :)
Thanks for helping spread the word with it.
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(BTW I realized last night that the non-TextMesh Pro font system actually does support all the Unicode characters, as they all show up perfectly fine in Overload. That gave me a bit of reassurance that I may have correctly understood how TextMesh functions, as if it utilized the underlying UI's capabilities, then we wouldn't be seeing unsupported characters. Either way, good that at least it's not an underlying system that's lacking the support!)
@Stinkypinky, @Freerider2141, @SnoWFLakE0s, @FeatherWing, @ShiroNeko, @Sparky6004, @MrGreen, plus anyone else who happened to share it with friends:
I just wanted to say thank You for helping to pass around this knowledge with the community :)
@hpgbproductions Just saw, and grabbed, the mod.
Thank you!
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I'm also here to make good on my offer to buy ya beer/coffee/lunch (ie $10USD). You can mention me or I can mention you in an Unlisted upload, to send me your PayPal address (which we can delete said upload afterwards to, ensure privacy).
Either way, I'm very grateful! :)
@AngularMomentum haha Touche (Although that'd flat out be a request for a different Font Style, as opposed to characters universal to all the included Fonts.)
@Bellcat @MrGreen The thing is, I don't think TextMesh Pro actually CARES about Unicode, UTF-8, or ASCII... Because, if I've followed their documentation correctly (source 1) all of the letters, numbers, and characters get converted into a single, giant 2D Texture (aka Atlas) which then gets referenced based on a coordinate system that corresponds to the particular character you want to have "typed" on the screen.
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You run a Font through their conversion utility and it converts the fonts into textures, or more accurately I guess they're closer to ye-olde "Sprites". I believe this is also part of the reason behind the (third party) company's choice in naming the Unity plugin: TextMesh Pro, as it displays everything using Meshes?
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Either way, the give-away for me, that these were being rendered is two fold:
1) The Update Notes they gave us for v1.11 in one of the blogs, indicated that the more text you have displayed, the more memory that's required by SP (I don't remember if they specified, but it'd be VRAM here, which is important since that's different from system memory in most cases)
2) If you pay attention in Designer when a Label is distanced from your build, it casts a Shadow. :P
Now... Even IF that's not the case (that they're not 'texture' assets), and encoding does matter here...
I won't pretend to know this for a fact, but, if I'm understanding this right then they DO currently support Unicode, or at least UTF-8 -- which would be sufficient to cover most of what I suggested. (Pretty sure the Undefined and Private Use would indeed require full, proper Unicode support.)
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My 'evidence' here (using Arial font) is that these Arrows already work in the game: ←↑→↓
Yet, for their Character Code, CharMap only displays the Unicode option: U+2190, U+2191, U+2192, U+2192.
Where understanding is, if they were old-school ASCII they would _also _ offer an ALT Code; for example the "currency sign": ¤ is Alt+0164
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My 2 cents at least...
@11qazxc Hmm interesting... All the Box Drawing characters I've pasted in (either from Arial or MS Gothic fonts) have all produced the "Unsupported Character Square of Doom" :\
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If you figure out any details on that, please let me know!
@Falkenwut I'll try some additional fonts that I know have a multitude of stars, as I don't think Arial actually had. any! (MS Gothic and MS UI Gothic are one of my go-to fonts for extra characters like that) ---RESULTS: I tried these on the line below (in case they don't show up)
≛⋆★☆☪✡✦✧✩✪✫✬✭✮✯✰✴✵✶✷✸✹❂
Unfortunately, no luck :( But I included them just in case it works for others, like how that Greek Delta DID work for me, but suddenly stopped (I haven't updated since v1.11 was released), so it's worth giving it a try yourself.
I think I'm going to make a formal Request for them and a metric boatload of other characters, to be added to the game. Some would certainly make replica aircraft require a few less parts by having text symbols instead of joined small fuselage pieces... There's a Hammer-and-Sickle character, as well as a Swastika, which would be useful, too. (which I fully appreciate the latter being a touchy one to deal with, and I know it's permitted for strictly historical builds on here, but intentionally including it might not be something Jundroo is comfortable with; perfectly acceptable if not)
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@X99STRIKER lmao You're.... welcome...?? :P
But srsly... You might change your mind when you see the sort of ways one could apply them as decals. Here's a Work In Progress of mine, to give you an example. The wing pattern was achieved by using only 1 label per wing (and only 2 characters per label)!
@MashMallow A few of the ones it likes to spawn that are user-made (or mine), like to do that on my game, too. I wasn't sure if that was as characteristic of the AI, or the Plane though. (sometimes the planes are borderline unstable just by design and the AI applies too much of counter-adjustment, causing it to really become unstable; thus, either behaving oddly or outright crashing)
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It's good to hear it isn't just me seeing that.
@Datcha lmao Pretty much, yes! Though, I believe the technical term for that is: "totally shitfaced drunk"
(which now that I actually think about the word, "shitfaced" is definitely an odd choice to describe a level of inebriation... hahah)
@hardy57 Glad to help.
I like to think outside the box and could already see the potential for the ability to use unique characters for not just HUDs or actual Labels, but also styling decals... It just takes a little creative thinking on how to combine/overlay multiple characters together using the Rich Text code. :D
@PioneerThe2nd They fly for me, don't get me wrong. Banking, turning, the occasional one getting stuck in and endless loop-de-loops session...
Some do fine landing at Wright Runway, too.
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But the North Runway, I've yet to see one succeed, they all seem to nose dive straight into the drink right before the runway, as if their map coordinates for that runway is off lol
I don't know how often the others crash into land/ocean though, since they weren't configured to be indestructible like Twin Prop oddly was... so they 'splode or sink, getting rid of any trace of the crash since their transponder goes dark.
@SnoWFLakE0s This guide doesn't have that included because.......... I don't have the FT knowledge and hadn't gotten around to even looking at the code on that 1-Part Hud, to probe how it gets things done! lol (thanks for reminding me!)
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As for having it hosted on your FT Guide site, that would be great! I'm sure everyone would greatly appreciate it in a static spot as well. :)
Which, secretly, that was what I was using my "Change Log" comments for... to keep the thread periodically bumped :}
Hmmm I probably should've tried the thing before I posted. heh
Applying that density variable to a Wing does NOT stick. It was probably removed from the game long ago and is a latent setting they forgot to remove.
@CovenantSlayer It's the same folder that our Planes get saved to.
If you're on PC, copy and paste this into a folder's "address box", or after opening Start Menu:
%USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\Jundroo\SimplePlanes
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Mac/Linux I dunno, but it's wherever you install Mods to; Mobile, you're on you own lol.
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Unfortunately, as I found out, we CANNOT modify it *sigh*
Or if we can it'll take doing something additional (I don't want ot make it Read-Only, but I will if I have to), but I went through the trouble of adding a whole bunch of "custom" parts to make my life easier, having pre-set XML options, but they didn't take because the file gets reset each game start. :(
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There weren't any other juicy bits in there unfortunately. No disable (hidden) parts, or the like. heh
But if you do take a look and also happen to notice it, I think the Studio related stuff are referring to the image of the Part in the Parts Catalog inside the Designer. (I think internally, the designer is called or referred to as the Studio.)
The Unique Characters, as requested to be posted (which show up mostly as a ? in my main post). Note: Most of the Zero-Width characters do not seem to display here, at least in my browser they aren't.
EDIT: @AndrewGarrison Not sure if this is a known Website Bug, but the above characters when posted in the main body, do not display; However, as you can see, they do just fine down here in the comments for some reason. (I'm out of my element here, but my suspicion would be main posts are encoded as ANSI, whereas comments are UTF-8/Unicode?)
@Bellcat I don't think the website supports them... :\ At least, when I've tried in the past they haven't worked. (With the new site features they've added in the last couple weeks, it's possible things have changed...)
Albeit, while the Delta character, comically, does work, for example the 4 thin Up, Down, Left, Right arrows do not.
I'll gladly paste them below this sentence, but I am not expecting anything to show up... At least, they don't for ME (if they do for you, let me know):
▀ ▄ █ ▌ ▐ ▓ ▒ ░ ■ ▬
▲►▼◄← ↑ → ↓ ‹ › »
◊ ○ ◌ ● ◘ ◙ ◦ • ∙ ˑ
☺☻ ☼ ♀ ♂ ♪ ♫
♠ ♣ ♥ ♦ ™ ® ¼ ½ ¾
 Ⱡ ⱡ Ɫ Ᵽ Ɽ ₤ ₫ € ⱷ þ Þ Ø ø
⁞
⁄ ⸗ ꜗ ꜘ ꜙ ᷀ ᷂ ᷃ ᷊
ˈ ‘ ’ ‚ ‛ “ ” „ ‟ ′ ″ ‴ … ‰ ‼ ÷ ±
ᶠ ᶥ ⁿ ₐ ₑ ₒ ₓ ₔ ° ² ³ º † ‡
‖ ‗ − ‒ – — ― ¯ ‾ ˉ
Δ Greek 'Delta'
As I recall, they display when pasting them, but once I hit Submit they vanish. Though, there's a whole row of stuff that it seems even my browser's font lacks heh (The first row of the "Zero-Width Combining Characters", but could be that it's due to the nature of the character that they aren't displaying here.)
. EDIT: Well, color me totally surprise, they did show up :)
Either way, the entire objective of this as an Uploaded Part, was for people to download it and drag the Label over the Sub Assembly button (that displays while dragging stuff) and then create their own part.
Once on a build where you wanted to utilize the characters, you'd place the Label I made, then Edit it to copy out the text needed. As it's WAY faster than having to switch screens to your browser to copy the characters. (I'm on PC and that's still how I do it, keep it in the background of my build! lol)
November 29th Changelog:
- Added the "Font Asset Names", which lists the in-game font name to the internal "font asset" name for TextMesh Pro. (Useless info at the moment)
- Uploaded a Label containing all the thus-far supported Unique Characters I've accumulated. I decided to do this so that Mobile users can download that make it into a Sub-Assembly, then copy-paste from it.
---- REQUEST: If any mobile users happen to use their keyboards to type in the various extended characters they have access to and find something not included, please share. Note: I only included obscure or symmetrical characters that could be used to stylize builds or interfaces. The "A" I included was for it's symmetrical element, but tried to stay away from non-English languages as to not offend anyone; the others in that row are Currency symbols. Thanks!
Aaannd stumble across ANOTHER one, this time coming out of the DesignerParts.xml...
On the "Vertical Stabilizer" and "Horizontal Stabilizer", in their Wing category, resides this curiosity: density="5.6"
The Primary, Structural Wing, and Structural Panel all lack it. That would make me think they're using a default value; however, if a part uses a default value that means it does not save it to the plane's XML file.... meaning that this density should show up in them (or through Override).
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At any rate, Googled "what is wing density" and:
Wing density is then simply the aircraft mass m over its wing volume VOLwing. This represents the mean density of the aircraft as if it were compressed into its wing.
(I had to fudge the formatting a bit since the forums doesn't support Subscript, but originally it was "VolWing" and Wing was subscript.)
From this journal/paper via Cambridge.org: "On the wing density and the inflation factor of aircraft"
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Unfortunately that's way out of my league... but, it sounds like POSSIBLY changing it can (if it's still supported in the game) could effect the "Wing Loading" value. And/Or impact the amount of Wing Flex exhibited in Wing-1 (unused part) and Wing-3 parts?? (as a Wing-2 part doesn't exhibit any flexing)
@Gestour I thought, technically speaking, someone recently (maybe Kenneth) had figured out that they could still release them for Android by using older tools?
I seem to recall reading that in the comments on one of that person's mod's page.
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Granted, this was during v1.10, and the switch to a newer built of Unity might've rendered their method unworkable...
Also will modify connections if you:
- Rotate a part, especially if it's near parts
- Accidentally-drag-your-entire-plane-instead-of-moving-the-camera and drop it on "Make a SubAssem" button to resolve the situation (partially).
- etc etc :(
I could make such a list of QoL Improvements (and, I have), that would make SP a more pleasing experience... but I don't think they're too interested in the low-hanging-fruit heh
Anywho, Rambo, out of curiosity, what are these builds? "One Build, One Day" uploads?
@11qazxc lol If it makes you feel any better, I can indeed claim that I upvoted it for the actual creation OF the image (the 'tech'), and not the image subject! Though, I do suspect you're right... :P
+1(srsly, too, I have no idea who that is, as the only anime I've really ever gotten into was Ghost in the Shell, specifically the GiG series.)
Yea, what's the challenge exactly? <_>
IA, or AI?
If AI, then Artificial Intelligence? Sounds difficult to pull off in SP heh
Or "Anti-Insurgency"? Granted, I don't know what that might entail, but it seems easier, at least for me... lol
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If "IA", then uh... I have no guesses what it could be... :}
EDIT: Oooh, you mean modify one of the default files in the AircraftDesigns folder, such as
+1__aiEscortEnemy__.xmlor__aiOpponentRacecar__.xml?@Something5353 [Note: This post is entirely predicated on the notion that you play on a PC or Mac.] Depending on your computer's graphic's chip maker is (AMD, nVidia, or Intel are who make the actual chips), you can probably create a game profile for SP and limit its framerate (FPS) that way.
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I know AMD can, at least on Windows, though it might take further behind-the-scenes tweaking to accomplish it, since it's profile only lets me set the framerate to a minimum of 30FPS (and editing the file all of these profiles is stored in, is a bit of a task, which even then whether or not it abides by setting it to "18" is an unknown!)
However... As I typed that, there MIGHT be another way.... I don't know how likely it is to work, though.
+1If you go in and edit your
Settingsfile in notepad, which is in the folder that has the "AircraftDesigns" folder (also the Mods folder if you have any installed), you can tell it what framerate to run at (... in theory, if it works that way).Mine for example is: targetFramerate="65"
You'd want to set it to: targetFramerate="18"
Save the file and load up SP then. (Technically, I suspect Android will have a similar "Settings.xml" and have the same data in it, since mine on Windows has Phone related settings, like Gyro sensor and Touch Controls)*
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Technically there's other methods to try and you can do it from the same settings file, It requires changing the Refresh Rate to 18 (the number in "Resolution" following the @ symbol; ie mine is 65Hz as defined by "
1920x1080@65") and then setting "VSyncEnabled" toTrue. That too, should force --in theory at least heh-- the game to run at 18FPS. But even then, I am even less confident it'd acciomplish what we want! The other would be using something like "ReShade", which I imagine would have a similar framerate limiting ability... But I digress... Getting ahead of myself!Try that out first heh If ypu need help let me know.
Smol Airport needs a Smol Plane!
+1Although, that might actually be much smaller than what I made... I know I had issues scaling it down that small, so I have no idea if going even smaller scale would continue to 'function' with Unity's Physics engine.
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That being said, I am willing to try 1/4-scaling my 1/4 scale, if you want? lol
ahahah Here I am, thinking "Hey! I can reduce the parts on this thing by like 200 or more!!"
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So I replace those ~25 parts-per-hub wheel outer-rings, with a single Hollow Fuselage of the correct size. Did just the back idler wheels first (whatever they're called, opposite of the sprocketed drive wheel). Get those two done (4 rings total), part count is down to 1026, nnnoice!
"I'll go test it now, see how it goes..."
..... -_-
Thanks, Jundroo, for making the defaults-to-curved-shape Fuselage have a -SQUARE- hitbox/collision box!!! *sigh*
I mean, it works fine, doesn't technically impede anything mechanically that I can tell, but VISUALLY... That's another story. Visually it is such a facepalm moment, as the tracks pass over those in a derpy square pattern overtop the round ("circular") fuselage part.... T_T
Teh Moar U Kno! _,-`*
+1At least I only burned 30mins on it :P
:O I'm with @jaynnie071621 on this... how is there only so few pieces?! lol I feel like it'd take me 200 just to make the amazing lighting that you pulled off, @Sayboye12!!
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Seriously, that night shot is very inspiring!
:thinking:
*I bet he made the beacons wide so that 1 could replace 4 or 5*
...downloads build to not only admire...................but unlock its secreetttsss...EDIT: *blinks* W..what the what...?! lmao
+1It doesn't use beacons to make those bits glow... <_0
Not sure I've unlocked any secrets yet, just more impressed bewilderment. Either it has beacons and you'e scaled them to be invisibru, or Glass Fuselage at certain size and color/transparency, just.... somehow emits light at night???
*scratches head*
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I've always liked my ability to think outside the box and make something look like something else, or use this to enhance that, but, damn. You are on a whole other level and I have MUCH to learn/figure out!!! o_o
Well since this seems acceptable... lol
!Test link #1 to this page
And now, bold??
!Test link #1 to this page
EDIT: @EternalDarkness it seems that the ! is no longer required for creating links?
+1May be handy to edit the OP to reflect that. [/2cents]
I make a nifty looking Supercharged V8... and then there's this. LOL
+1.
Damn is that impressive! :D
What exactly is "unstable" about it? (Besides when toggling Auto Pilot)
+1For me, it flies better than the majority. There was a slight wobble during take-off, but after that only minimal automatic roll with a little bit of pitch-up while in flight. Both of which are lower than a lot of the planes I make, which I then have a lot of tweaking to do afterwards lol
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BTW out of curiosity, what was your intention with that Rotator in the back? It's only connected to the Fuselage around the engine, and wouldn't do anything from what I can tell... If you were trying to add Thrust Vectoring for the engine, I can try to add that for ya.
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EDIT: Aah ok, I think I see where you're coming from now... At insanely high speeds, under "constant-input-control" (aka, Mouse, or a touchscreen in your case), it gets a horrible case of the Speed-Wobbles. Particularly when in lower altitudes with denser atmosphere.
The real solution, there, is simple: Don't use such an absurd Throttle setting as "sum(Throttle*9+sum(0)" lol
I don't quite see the purpose of it anyhow, besides......... I assume..... giving infinite "Max" throttle, and thus unlimited speed. The downside I'm seeing, is when used on a jet-engine, it's not allowing you to throttle down, and leaves you stuck at max-throttle.
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I removed all the fuel (and Deadweight) from the body panels, restored their Scale to 1, and added a "Fuel Tank" block, then modified its capacity to 3x what you had, changed its Mass scale to be the same as what it had been... and now it can fly much much longer! :P (I also added rear landing gear, but that was mostly so I could take off trouble free.)
Ah, twin gatling guns, good.
+1So this dragon can indeed breathe fire! :P
@Hedero
+1Hed Solo: "She'll make point-five past lightspeed. She may not look like much, but she's got it where it counts, kid. I've added some special modifications myself."
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shrug This seemed quite fitting, given the context!
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As to not spam, I'll just edit this comment with my observations...
1. At 1% throttle, the engine audibly spooled up 'normally', albeit very slow. HOWEVER, after leveling the craft out, I increased it to 100% and... then the engine's audio seemed to imply it was spooling /down/? Poor SP, its probably thinking "How to do sound for engines with power set at 1E+08?!?" :P
2. Warp-drive, indeed! From 0 to Max Speed instantly, even at... well lets call "1% Throttle" Warp-1?? heh
3. It did eventually level out and stop spinning, whether that something it manages to do on its own, or if my countering it with the opposite roll/yaw inputs had any impact... I dunno.
4. You mentioned the clouds. While in flight I noticed... that is besides the obvious fact that they are zipping by ""Fast AF""... is even their texturing is LITERALLY getting warped! haha
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/765012057807781888/853692186867531806/unknown.png
5. My guess is that speed is a hard limit (sadly only 0.11183264285 of lightspeed) and is due to SP never being ported over to 64bit Unity...?
At least on Windows that is. As my understanding was all MacOS/iOS software was required to be 64bit as of ~2yrs ago, so I imagine that means yours isn't 32bit. If that's the case, is your max speed higher than what I achieved?
@KalubMcCoy Crap, there IS a name for this sort of thing....
+1clickety-clack
Google says it's "Biomimicry" (Biomimetics), and although that wasn't the word I had in mind, I'm not going to dispute the definition of a word but assume that whatever I had in mind wasn't correct anyhow :P
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biomimetics
(I believe the ME-262 qualifies as an example, being that its body was inspired by the shape of a shark; which one specifically it was, I cannot recall, unfortunately)
""some type of watercraft""
+1Yea, that definitely is accurate, given it's a Gator/Croc! hahah
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Looks good though, and I approve of such crazy thinking! :P
@Mixx @TheFlyingPiano @titandeathgripper123 Looks like you can make it less fragile by fixing a lot of the part's Connections. Running "AutoConnect" on quite a lot of them will increase their connections considerably. HOWEVER, it's hard to say which ones to use it on is tough to say (though just about everything on each engine nacelle will benefit greatly from doing this), because doing it on some actually causes it to lose some connection points, others to lose LOTS of them, and others to lose important ones that cause them to cease being part of the craft! lol
+1Ones NOT to do it to: All of the Air Brakes, the very middle part of 'ornamental belt' under the orange "glass" (causes the entire 'belt' to disconnect from the craft).
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One example of "Things to Do or Not Do": was that on the three-engine circular "shoulder" assemblies at the left and right corners... where you start and finish is REALLY tricky. Because when you AutoConnect some, after others, they'll lose a lot of their connections.
Like, the actual 3 jet engines you see sticking out you should do the AutoConnect on them LAST. I did the three big silver rings first, then the gray curved blocks after (but NOT the last one on the very top!), then the 3 engine cowlings, and finally the 3 engines inside (hard to click on some stuff, so be careful).
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I'd upload mine, but unfortunately it seems that since not all of the Connections get Mirrored along with their parts, it means that doing the exact same stuff between both sides yielded something that was different. As such, the craft developed a bad yaw-right pull and so it wouldn't be right (I felt) to share it since the original flew straight.
@RamboJutter Do we have any idea why it uses a V-12, despite having what appears to be some sort of thruster at the back? That's what I found to be the most curious aspect of the artwork :P
Consider this my upvote, since I lack the 30-points requirement :)
+1@V Can you please @ me when you post your findings? :)
Also, thanks for taking the time to do so!
CHANGE LOG:
Updated planes (via XML) will have their name include a
Mk.modifier to function as a "version" system. Updates with lots of changes will receive a full number increment(ie Mk.II, Mk.III ... Mk.IX); minor changes (like bug fixes or label typos) will simply append a lowercase letter(ie Mk.IVa, Mk.IVb ... Mk.IVm)Mk.II
Altitude- This will also readout based on whether the "Metric" button is toggled!MachGsRPM(a numerical display for RPM makes it easier to throttle back for fuel economy, but maintain max speed)materialis now14,6,6instead of18,6,6)[FEET]will change to read[METERS]when the Metric button is toggled@SilverStar It's only 2ft shorter than a P-51 :) (32.25' vs 29.6')
It's an optical illusion caused by moving the cockpit so far back.
However, I agree, it looks "off", as you described. I probably would've tapered its tail more, but with being limited by a fixed-dimension cockpit part (ie, can't make the front and back widths different sizes), I had to make due with how it is. Although, looking at that top-down image, I could possibly trim the pieces just behind the cockpit and in front of the tail. But I don't think it'd really help make it look any longer from the side.
Also *le gasp* Thanks to everyone for the spotlights (sorry @Clutch I had meant to thank you earlier!), AND even by Mr... mm I'll avoid a SouthPark reference... AndrewGarrison! <3 And it meeting the standards to get Curated makes me happy, as that was a personal goal I thought I'd miss out on! :D
EDIT: Although, I'd forgotten that updating the XML would require it to be RE-curated. At least I saw it had been! heh
Updated XML with lots of changes: bug fixes, tweaks, and new instrumentation functionality.
I'll move that list to a stickied comment to act as the Change Log post for that specific update, including the updated name that the plane with those changes has, so anyone who already downloaded it at some other point, can reference the name to know which one they have. (Will use the Mk. system instead of version; this being
Mk.II, whereas the original release lacked that.)EDIT: I'm not sure if the new plane is available through the main Download button, or if it's what's in the XML History? The 2D images do not appear to be based on the new XML though, as the Tsunami label still faces the other direction.
I corrected some drag that I didn't know had cropped up after my removal of "spare parts" I had laying around my designer. That, plus 9-bladed propeller @ 35,000FT = Mach 1.00 in level flight :) (35,188ft @ 668mph)
I was incrementally going up altitude levels, which combined with having no speed loss, was slowly lowering the Speed of Sound (thereby, increasing my Mach), and I finally ticked over 1.0..... with 1% fuel left :P
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While I AM going to be updating the XML shortly, the 9-blade will be absent.
However, the corrected Drag points will be included. As well as:
- Removal of a Sphere in the left gear well that I forgot to delete
- Fixed an itty-bitty bug in my Low Fuel Warning causing the mighty big issue of... it not displaying at ALL. (whoops!)
- Tweaked the PREV and NEXT Targets buttons back to where I had them originally.
- Changed a number of Labels' font on the Instrument Cluster to Roboto, to match the other labels that were using it. (with the exception of Roll/Slip and the Clock, which remain Military, to preserve formatting)
- Decided to change the color on the text for Altitude, to match the rest (
materialis now14,6,6instead of18,6,6)- Addition of a small Digital Display in the empty space under the "Throttle" gauge, which contains:
---- Altitude - This will also readout based on whether the "Metric" button is toggled!
---- Mach
---- Gs
---- RPM (a numerical display for RPM makes it easier to throttle back for fuel economy, but maintain max speed)
- Also added the Selectable Altitude readout from the digital display, to also switch the actual Altitude gauge; Defaults to Feet, "Metric" button converts to Meters (hurray for recycling of code!)
- Fixed the Clock's Numbers label being too far away from the gauge face.
- Fixed Rate of Climb gauge placement
- Micro-adjustments to most of the gauges for symmetry
- Changed Button color to be darker (fixes over-bright when selected)
---- Also changed the Tooltips on Metric and Knots, from "Airspeed: " to " Readouts", as now those (well, Metric) also applies to other displays.
---- And added some Transparency to all the Tooltips, to make them less visually intrusive. (If anyone feels their text should also get made smaller, let me know.)
- Removed a superfluous fuselage part from the cockpit
---- Moved the Attachment Point of the "Retract Gear" warning label from that part, to the dash cowling
- Changed color of Cockpit's "dash" and a piece of Fuselage under the point of the Canopy from the Silver, to the Midnight Blue
- Tweaked <cspace> on the two invisible Warning labels, to help make them easier to read.
- Minor: spun the unused "Tsunami" label around so that it can be read from the "2D" images on the page (assuming they update when a new XML is uploaded)
edit: added additional entries to the Change Log
_edit2: sorry for epic delay in getting the XML uploaded; was under the weather yesterday.
@ChiChiWerx Just to clarify, as there seemed to be a misunderstanding :}
Yes, lower altitude and thus higher air density is better for engine power output.
I suspect the mixup was in regard to where I said the "higher DA, the better", in which I only meant the calculated "DA" value that was being referenced for drag racing. Which even then, I could've mis-remembered. (and is quite likely!)
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Either way, I didn't mean to convey that a "higher altitude" was better. :P Sorry for that confusion.
I'm going to hide my one huge embarassment down in here... lol
The Elevators racing-stripes, took me quite a bit to get them anal-retentively-perfect... only to have the damn things somehow not match the movements of the Wing Elevators they've wrapped overtop of!!! >_<
Just.... just please don't look at it! hahah You should be enjoying the flight from inside the cockpit anyhow! :}
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If anyone knows how to fix that though, I'm not above accepting the help!
@ChiChiWerx Thanks for clarifying, AND, for divising that formula for us! :D
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Having no idea what the values were, I started doing what I do, and just mucking with it further. Comparing back and forth between that NASA Calculator and the values my modifications were generating.
Again, I didn't know until just now, what it was all about, but I was coming here to follow up to say that I had managed to fine tune it further. Though, I only tested it at 33,000ft and 1,019ft:
TAS/(341-clamp((Altitude*0.0041437),0,43)).
However, at those two altitudes, it's:
@ 33,000ft - within a few-ten-thousandths off. (NASA Calc only returns to the thousandths 0.734, to my 0.7339)
@ 1,019ft - it's only roughly 2-thousandths off; 0.735 calced vs my 0.7339
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I assume that the one oddity I noticed while changing the "per meter of altitude" number, was that up at 33,000ft, anything over
0.0042(regardless of the initial divisor used) resulted in the same output value.... However, as I check now while it's paused at 1,019ft, all of those readings are now.Am I correct in my presumption that the reasons is due to the "correction" was running into your imposed clamped maximum of 43?
In the end I think I see where a lot of my initial issue with wrapping my head around it all, was coming from...
I was erroneously pairing temperature with air density on account that at Sea Level, temperature DOES impact air density. A couple decades back I remember some folk who frequent the drag strip, mentioning "DA" (Density Altitude), and that it was was (somehow) determined based on the altitude the track was at, and the air temp of that day. If I recall correctly, the higher the DA the, better, since it meant denser air, which for them meant they could run inject more fuel (they were all easily able to change the programming on their ECU).
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Fast forward to now, and while I'm sure that temperature is a factor, it no doubt is trivial in comparison to the altitude. Where the amount of atmosphere above that's weighing down is substantially less, causing less compression and thus a thinner atmosphere. (to put it crudely, as is all I'm capable of! lmao)
@edensk Well, bummer. Do we know why Jundroo didn't opt to have TAS factor in altitude (density)?
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Also, out of curiosity, why does one want to use 340 instead of 343? Is it because of the inherent rounding error SP is prone to, where 340 accounts for that?
Or even a simpler reason: it's easier to remember and still "close enough"? lol
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Either way, thank you for that! And for the fact that you've always been a great help to anyone with coding question :D
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EDIT: Oh and then safe to assume that just removing
/340in order to have it output the Altitude-Adjusted-TAS speed?@X99STRIKER
If my post is really long, take your phone with to the john!
When you're going #2, read it while you're on the loo!
:P
@marcox43 My problem is that if it IS True Air Speed, that only makes it far more likely to be a Bug, since for True Air Speed (emphasis mine):
(source: AeroToolbox)
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Worthy of note is that the middle part, is definitely true with SP.
GS==TASwhen Wind is disabled.Or is that Jundroo's intention for
TASin Simple Planes... that its sole function is to provide an accurate speed when, and ONLY when, the player has Wind enabled??.
I was always under the assumption that it'd be tied to air density on account of the fact that clearly there is SOME density modeling included, since we experience it when passing through certain altitudes...
Around 11,000ft is the first density change I'm aware of.
Another I believe around 25,000ft
I think one around 39,000ft
I've not spend enough time in the 45,000-80,000 range
Pretty sure there's also one somewhere between 91,000-110,000ft
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That 11,000ft one is the more easily experienced density, particularly in jet powered craft, and especially if it's a faster plane.
.......
Actually! It just dawned on me that the density is modeled MORE than just in that way!
In my current build, which is a Piston Prop, I have the engine RPM-Limited to 3200RPM [
maxRpmat3232]. It's power output is 3500HP, and that's unfortunately way more than needed for SP's physics, for my build (modeled after a Race plane), as just about anything >75% throttle at low altitudes is wasted since its already at Max RPM..
At 40,000ft, I can throttle down to about 18%, still achieving Max RPM and therefore suffer no performance loss. At various altitudes I have to use different throttle levels to balance that out, but the benefit of doing so is fuel economy -- legitimate in game economy, not just speaking to real life aircraft performance.
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My point summarized in a question: if density is modeled to the degree that it is... why wouldn't they be utilizing it with
TAS? 🤔Decided to make a second comment since I was about to run out of space in that one:
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My tips:
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Good luck, and may the Force (of Lift overcoming Gravity) be with you.
Everything has been summed up pretty well. My suggestion is, if you're not already a coder, to worry about learning or creating complex Funky Tree controlled vehicles LAST.
You can manage to accomplish a lot of stuff simply by knowing the "IF ? THAN : ELSE" statement.
Granted, you need to know the various different input names/values in order to make that statement "work", but you'd be surprised how easy things are with just that lol
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Seriously, I can sort of read code snippets enough to follow along, but I'm a certifiable Coding Moron at the end of the day. Just knowing that single thing has let me accomplish some useful stuff (sadly I have no on-hand example for ya, wish I did).
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Instead, focus on how to use the game interface, and the "quirks" of the system (there are a LOT of quirks unfortunately). Then familiarize yourself with the parts, their individual good and bad attributes. Next work on getting a handle on creating a simple, but functional plane -- by that I mean that it flies well with minimal effort, and doesn't want to enter into a death-spiral when maneuvering (in other words: the fine balancing act between Center of Lift, Center of Mass, and Center of Thrust).
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Once you have it so you know those "basic" things involved to make a functional plane, learn how to manipulate the Fuselage part to make it look interesting ways, so that you can use it to create the curves your need.
Making "complex" looking builds will bring the challenge of your planes now not wanting to fly right, which will lead you to "XML Modding"; also know as "using the Override menu". As you'll need to turn off or decrease the amount of Drag parts make (as the game is nowhere near perfect in modeling airflow once you start making complex stuff), or lower the mass of others, even make others not physically interact with your plane so that they work as designed (ie landing gear).
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By THEN you'll be at a point where you'll want to learn the Funky Trees coding. (It's called "Funky Trees" because it's a language special to Simple PLanes which when created, was used to make the Palm Trees react as you got closer, which looks rather.... funky in their behavior)
@parkrangerjerry God that's hilarious, only because it certainly feels that way every...damn...time... ahahah
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LIGHTBULB!!
That's the next Mod we need!
Anytime the user invokes an action, be it applying a setting to a label, or using Override, or Fine Tuner (mod), the mod will then Add a part (randomly, far from your build) and delete it. (or, invoke two Nudges: one in any direction and the other in the opposite direction.)
WHY? Because that does cause the game to write an event to the Undo History, allowing you to actually use it for what it was meant for ;)
(I try to make a point of doing that before doing something major that I fear will have undesirable consequences, just so I can use CTR+Z)
UNFORESEEN BONUS!!
This just saved me a bit of time having to re-make something in a Label, due to using "Undo" and having forgotten that just about NOTHING gets applied to the Undo History now. As a result, using "Undo" not only rolled back all the work done in that label... but a ton more work done in ANOTHER label! T_T
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Was able to pop into that backup folder, then simply copy over the most recent Backup from there over into the AircraftDesigns folder, and load that "backup########" build! :D
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Literally
The gift that keeps on giving...*nods* The S in "hpgbproductions" stands for Santa
@MrGreen No problem and you're welcome :)
Thanks for helping spread the word with it.
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(BTW I realized last night that the non-TextMesh Pro font system actually does support all the Unicode characters, as they all show up perfectly fine in Overload. That gave me a bit of reassurance that I may have correctly understood how TextMesh functions, as if it utilized the underlying UI's capabilities, then we wouldn't be seeing unsupported characters. Either way, good that at least it's not an underlying system that's lacking the support!)
@Stinkypinky, @Freerider2141, @SnoWFLakE0s, @FeatherWing, @ShiroNeko, @Sparky6004, @MrGreen, plus anyone else who happened to share it with friends:
I just wanted to say thank You for helping to pass around this knowledge with the community :)
@hpgbproductions Just saw, and grabbed, the mod.
Thank you!
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I'm also here to make good on my offer to buy ya beer/coffee/lunch (ie $10USD). You can mention me or I can mention you in an Unlisted upload, to send me your PayPal address (which we can delete said upload afterwards to, ensure privacy).
Either way, I'm very grateful! :)
@AngularMomentum haha Touche
(Although that'd flat out be a request for a different Font Style, as opposed to characters universal to all the included Fonts.)
@Bellcat @MrGreen The thing is, I don't think TextMesh Pro actually CARES about Unicode, UTF-8, or ASCII... Because, if I've followed their documentation correctly (source 1) all of the letters, numbers, and characters get converted into a single, giant 2D Texture (aka Atlas) which then gets referenced based on a coordinate system that corresponds to the particular character you want to have "typed" on the screen.
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You run a Font through their conversion utility and it converts the fonts into textures, or more accurately I guess they're closer to ye-olde "Sprites". I believe this is also part of the reason behind the (third party) company's choice in naming the Unity plugin: TextMesh Pro, as it displays everything using Meshes?
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Either way, the give-away for me, that these were being rendered is two fold:
1) The Update Notes they gave us for v1.11 in one of the blogs, indicated that the more text you have displayed, the more memory that's required by SP (I don't remember if they specified, but it'd be VRAM here, which is important since that's different from system memory in most cases)
2) If you pay attention in Designer when a Label is distanced from your build, it casts a Shadow. :P
Now... Even IF that's not the case (that they're not 'texture' assets), and encoding does matter here...
I won't pretend to know this for a fact, but, if I'm understanding this right then they DO currently support Unicode, or at least UTF-8 -- which would be sufficient to cover most of what I suggested. (Pretty sure the Undefined and Private Use would indeed require full, proper Unicode support.)
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My 'evidence' here (using Arial font) is that these Arrows already work in the game: ←↑→↓
Yet, for their Character Code, CharMap only displays the Unicode option:
U+2190,U+2191,U+2192,U+2192.Where understanding is, if they were old-school ASCII they would _also _ offer an ALT Code; for example the "currency sign": ¤ is
Alt+0164.
My 2 cents at least...
@11qazxc Hmm interesting... All the Box Drawing characters I've pasted in (either from Arial or MS Gothic fonts) have all produced the "Unsupported Character Square of Doom" :\
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If you figure out any details on that, please let me know!
@Falkenwut I'll try some additional fonts that I know have a multitude of stars, as I don't think Arial actually had. any! (
MS GothicandMS UI Gothicare one of my go-to fonts for extra characters like that)---RESULTS: I tried these on the line below (in case they don't show up)
≛⋆★☆☪✡✦✧✩✪✫✬✭✮✯✰✴✵✶✷✸✹❂
Unfortunately, no luck :( But I included them just in case it works for others, like how that Greek Delta DID work for me, but suddenly stopped (I haven't updated since v1.11 was released), so it's worth giving it a try yourself.
I think I'm going to make a formal Request for them and a metric boatload of other characters, to be added to the game. Some would certainly make replica aircraft require a few less parts by having text symbols instead of joined small fuselage pieces... There's a Hammer-and-Sickle character, as well as a Swastika, which would be useful, too. (which I fully appreciate the latter being a touchy one to deal with, and I know it's permitted for strictly historical builds on here, but intentionally including it might not be something Jundroo is comfortable with; perfectly acceptable if not)
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@X99STRIKER lmao You're.... welcome...?? :P
But srsly... You might change your mind when you see the sort of ways one could apply them as decals. Here's a Work In Progress of mine, to give you an example. The wing pattern was achieved by using only 1 label per wing (and only 2 characters per label)!
@MashMallow A few of the ones it likes to spawn that are user-made (or mine), like to do that on my game, too. I wasn't sure if that was as characteristic of the AI, or the Plane though.
(sometimes the planes are borderline unstable just by design and the AI applies too much of counter-adjustment, causing it to really become unstable; thus, either behaving oddly or outright crashing)
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It's good to hear it isn't just me seeing that.
@Datcha lmao Pretty much, yes! Though, I believe the technical term for that is: "totally shitfaced drunk"
(which now that I actually think about the word, "shitfaced" is definitely an odd choice to describe a level of inebriation... hahah)
@hardy57 Glad to help.
I like to think outside the box and could already see the potential for the ability to use unique characters for not just HUDs or actual Labels, but also styling decals... It just takes a little creative thinking on how to combine/overlay multiple characters together using the Rich Text code. :D
@PioneerThe2nd They fly for me, don't get me wrong. Banking, turning, the occasional one getting stuck in and endless loop-de-loops session...
Some do fine landing at Wright Runway, too.
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But the North Runway, I've yet to see one succeed, they all seem to nose dive straight into the drink right before the runway, as if their map coordinates for that runway is off lol
I don't know how often the others crash into land/ocean though, since they weren't configured to be indestructible like Twin Prop oddly was... so they 'splode or sink, getting rid of any trace of the crash since their transponder goes dark.
@SnoWFLakE0s This guide doesn't have that included because.......... I don't have the FT knowledge and hadn't gotten around to even looking at the code on that 1-Part Hud, to probe how it gets things done! lol (thanks for reminding me!)
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As for having it hosted on your FT Guide site, that would be great! I'm sure everyone would greatly appreciate it in a static spot as well. :)
Which, secretly, that was what I was using my "Change Log" comments for... to keep the thread periodically bumped :}
Hmmm I probably should've tried the thing before I posted. heh
Applying that
densityvariable to a Wing does NOT stick. It was probably removed from the game long ago and is a latent setting they forgot to remove.@CovenantSlayer It's the same folder that our Planes get saved to.
If you're on PC, copy and paste this into a folder's "address box", or after opening Start Menu:
%USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\Jundroo\SimplePlanes
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Mac/Linux I dunno, but it's wherever you install Mods to; Mobile, you're on you own lol.
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Unfortunately, as I found out, we CANNOT modify it *sigh*
Or if we can it'll take doing something additional (I don't want ot make it Read-Only, but I will if I have to), but I went through the trouble of adding a whole bunch of "custom" parts to make my life easier, having pre-set XML options, but they didn't take because the file gets reset each game start. :(
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There weren't any other juicy bits in there unfortunately. No disable (hidden) parts, or the like. heh
But if you do take a look and also happen to notice it, I think the
Studiorelated stuff are referring to the image of the Part in the Parts Catalog inside the Designer. (I think internally, the designer is called or referred to as the Studio.)The Unique Characters, as requested to be posted (which show up mostly as a ? in my main post). Note: Most of the Zero-Width characters do not seem to display here, at least in my browser they aren't.
EDIT: @AndrewGarrison Not sure if this is a known Website Bug, but the above characters when posted in the main body, do not display; However, as you can see, they do just fine down here in the comments for some reason. (I'm out of my element here, but my suspicion would be main posts are encoded as ANSI, whereas comments are UTF-8/Unicode?)
Just realized I also had forgotten to link to my Resource post in the description... oops.
I'll put it here, too:
Rich Text Code resources
@Bellcat I don't think the website supports them... :\ At least, when I've tried in the past they haven't worked. (With the new site features they've added in the last couple weeks, it's possible things have changed...)
Albeit, while the Delta character, comically, does work, for example the 4 thin Up, Down, Left, Right arrows do not.
I'll gladly paste them below this sentence, but I am not expecting anything to show up... At least, they don't for ME (if they do for you, let me know):
▀ ▄ █ ▌ ▐ ▓ ▒ ░ ■ ▬
▲►▼◄← ↑ → ↓ ‹ › »
◊ ○ ◌ ● ◘ ◙ ◦ • ∙ ˑ
☺☻ ☼ ♀ ♂ ♪ ♫
♠ ♣ ♥ ♦ ™ ® ¼ ½ ¾
 Ⱡ ⱡ Ɫ Ᵽ Ɽ ₤ ₫ € ⱷ þ Þ Ø ø
⁞
⁄ ⸗ ꜗ ꜘ ꜙ ᷀ ᷂ ᷃ ᷊
ˈ ‘ ’ ‚ ‛ “ ” „ ‟ ′ ″ ‴ … ‰ ‼ ÷ ±
ᶠ ᶥ ⁿ ₐ ₑ ₒ ₓ ₔ ° ² ³ º † ‡
‖ ‗ − ‒ – — ― ¯ ‾ ˉ
Δ Greek 'Delta'
As I recall, they display when pasting them, but once I hit Submit they vanish. Though, there's a whole row of stuff that it seems even my browser's font lacks heh (The first row of the "Zero-Width Combining Characters", but could be that it's due to the nature of the character that they aren't displaying here.)
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EDIT: Well, color me totally surprise, they did show up :)
Either way, the entire objective of this as an Uploaded Part, was for people to download it and drag the Label over the Sub Assembly button (that displays while dragging stuff) and then create their own part.
Once on a build where you wanted to utilize the characters, you'd place the Label I made, then Edit it to copy out the text needed. As it's WAY faster than having to switch screens to your browser to copy the characters.
(I'm on PC and that's still how I do it, keep it in the background of my build! lol)
November 29th Changelog:
- Added the "Font Asset Names", which lists the in-game font name to the internal "font asset" name for TextMesh Pro. (Useless info at the moment)
- Uploaded a Label containing all the thus-far supported Unique Characters I've accumulated. I decided to do this so that Mobile users can download that make it into a Sub-Assembly, then copy-paste from it.
---- REQUEST: If any mobile users happen to use their keyboards to type in the various extended characters they have access to and find something not included, please share. Note: I only included obscure or symmetrical characters that could be used to stylize builds or interfaces. The "A" I included was for it's symmetrical element, but tried to stay away from non-English languages as to not offend anyone; the others in that row are Currency symbols. Thanks!
Aaannd stumble across ANOTHER one, this time coming out of the DesignerParts.xml...
On the "Vertical Stabilizer" and "Horizontal Stabilizer", in their
Wingcategory, resides this curiosity:density="5.6"
The Primary, Structural Wing, and Structural Panel all lack it. That would make me think they're using a default value; however, if a part uses a default value that means it does not save it to the plane's XML file.... meaning that this
densityshould show up in them (or through Override)..
At any rate, Googled "what is wing density" and:
(I had to fudge the formatting a bit since the forums doesn't support Subscript, but originally it was "VolWing" and Wing was subscript.)
From this journal/paper via Cambridge.org: "On the wing density and the inflation factor of aircraft"
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Unfortunately that's way out of my league... but, it sounds like POSSIBLY changing it can (if it's still supported in the game) could effect the "Wing Loading" value. And/Or impact the amount of Wing Flex exhibited in
Wing-1(unused part) andWing-3parts?? (as aWing-2part doesn't exhibit any flexing)@Gestour I thought, technically speaking, someone recently (maybe Kenneth) had figured out that they could still release them for Android by using older tools?
I seem to recall reading that in the comments on one of that person's mod's page.
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Granted, this was during v1.10, and the switch to a newer built of Unity might've rendered their method unworkable...
@hpgbproductions YAY
Am many exite!
Now to wait patiently :D
Also will modify connections if you:
- Rotate a part, especially if it's near parts
- Accidentally-drag-your-entire-plane-instead-of-moving-the-camera and drop it on "Make a SubAssem" button to resolve the situation (partially).
- etc etc :(
I could make such a list of QoL Improvements (and, I have), that would make SP a more pleasing experience... but I don't think they're too interested in the low-hanging-fruit heh
Anywho, Rambo, out of curiosity, what are these builds? "One Build, One Day" uploads?