Pinter Computing

The Kerbal Space Program Delta V Map helps to calculate the required propulsion to reach the Kerbol System’s planetary bodies.

KSP 2 version 0.2.0.0, “For Science!” opens an entirely new type of game play. Now we can complete missions, do science experiments, collect Science Points and unlock new parts in the Research and Development Center.

Recommended mods

The Science Arkive mod lists all available experiments by celestial body, so check it before you launch. It is available in the VAB and Map View.

The Orbital Survey mod displays information on the planet and moon scanning process.

Environment Survey

There are three kind of experiments in the game that award you science points:

• Crew observations
  
• Surface Survey
  
• Environment Survey
  
  

The first two are performed by the crew by writing down their experiences and taking surface samples. The third experiment requires a Science Collector. Make sure all of your command modules and landers contain one, to be able to survey the orbit and surface of Kerbin and other celestial bodies after landing.

Scanning celestial bodies

There are two scanning modes: Visual and Region scan. The scanning mode depends on the antenna.

Hardware

The RA-15 Static Antenna performs visual scan

The Communotron DTS-M1 deployable antenna performs region scan.

Orbit inclination

To scan a celestial body, we need to place the space craft in a 90° inclination orbit. This way the planet or moon rotates under the space craft while orbiting it in the same plane.

To place a craft in a 90° inclination orbit around Kerbin, launch the vessel in the North or South direction. As the rotation’s angular velocity is zero, you need significantly more delta V (fuel) to reach the same orbital altitude.

Orbital altitude

The field of view of the antenna is 3°. The diameter of the planet or moon determines the ideal scanning altitude.

When the antenna is not extended, the displayed minimal, optimal and maximum scanning altitude values are not correct. To view the correct values:

• Place the craft in an orbit around the celestial body,
• Right-click the Communotron DTS-M1 antenna to open the Parts Manager,
• Extend the antenna,
• Read the minimum, ideal and maximum scanning altitudes.
  
  The scanning altitudes depend on the diameter of the celestial body. For simplicity, the bodies are grouped into three categories: small (max 150 km radius), medium (max 350 km radius), large (max 10,000 km radius)

Body	Visual Scan Minimum	Visual Scan Ideal	Visual Scan Maximum	Region Scan Minimum	Region Scan Ideal	Region Scan Maximum
Kerbin (large)	500 km	800 km	1,100 km	1,000 km	1,500 km	2,000 km
Mun (medium)	100 km	300 km	500 km	300 km	500 km	700 km
Minmus (small)
Duna (medium)	100 km	300 km	500 km	300 km	500 km	700 km

Scanning progress

To see the progress of the scanning, open the Orbital Survey mod

Select the body

The dropdown lists the bodies which has scanning data

Vessels

The VES button displays the scanning vessel names around the body.

Overlay

The OVL button displays the scanned regions on the body surface.

Collecting Science Points

When 25%, 50%, 75% and 100% of the body has been scanned, science points are awarded. The full orbital region scan of a celestial body awards 180 Science Points.

• Check the progress on the Orbital Survey display.
  
• When the next threshold is reached, open the Research Inventory and transmit the results. To make sure all data is transmitted, you can click the Transmit All button instead.
  

• To speed up the orbital scanning, set the time warp to 100% and have dinner. By the time you are done, the planet most likely has been scanned.

• Click the TRANSMIT ALL button to send the data to Mission Control and collect the Science Points.

Sample Grabber

The RSCM-01 Sample Grabber has to be mounted with the drill facing up. Mounting it on the top surface will place it in the correct direction.

To save space, we can move the grabber arm inside the rover body, it is not that elegant, but still works:

Troubleshooting

If the RSCM-01 Sample Grabber is mounted on the side of the rover, we get a misleading error message when we try to run a survey:

Surface Survey Status:

Invalid Research Location

Revert to VAB takes away the progress during that flight

When you revert to VAB, the progress achieved during that flight disappears:

• You lose the science points collected during the flight,
• You lose the already unlocked parts during the mission.

During the building of a Docker container for a Python application we may get the following error message

ERROR: Could not install packages due to an OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: ‘/private/var/folders/sy/f16zz6x50xz3113nwtb9bvq00000gp/T/abs_477u68wvzm/croot/certifi_1671487773341/work/certifi

This is caused by an out of date path in the requirements file for “certifi”. To fix the issue

• Uninstall and reinstall certifi

pip uninstall certifi
pip install certifi

• Regenerate the requirements.txt file

pip freeze > requirements.txt

To scan with the Canon Maxify GX4020 all-in-one inkjet printer

Install the IJ Scan Utility

• In your browser navigate to MAXIFY GX4020 Software & Drivers
• Select the operating system name and version
• Download the Print Driver and Scan Utility Installer
• Double-click the downloaded file to install the Scanner Utility
  • Select the printer and click the Next button
    

Scanning with the IJ Scan Utility

Start the IJ Scan Utility

The IJ Scan Utility is located in the Canon Utilities folder of the Start Menu

To use the preview function

• Click the ScanGear button
  
• On the Basic Mode tab click the Preview button
  
• If you want to configure more settings, use the Advanced Mode tab
  

Troubleshooting

You are trying to scan an image exceeding 100 MB. If you want to scan this image, reduce image size or disable the thumbnails view mode.

To turn off the thumbnails mode

• In the upper left corner of the ScanGear window click the Thumbnail view mode button.
  

Replacing the printer or changing the network connection

The installer saves the MAC address of the printer, so if you need to replace the already selected printer, or you are changing between Wi-Fi and wired network connection, you need to first uninstall and reinstall the Canon IJ Scan Utility. Even if you run the Scanner Selector application, it does not replace the scanner information in the scanner application. The Wi-Fi and wired network adapters have different MAC addresses.

• Uninstall the Canon IJ Scan Utility
  
• Reinstall the Canon IJ Scanner Utility (see above)

When mods are installed and enabled, we still need to activate the UI of the mods to use them.

To activate the UI of an installed and enabled mod

• Click the App Tray button in the lower right corner of the screen
• Click the name of the mod
  

Visual Studio Code is the preferred text editor for most developers on Mac and Windows workstations.

To debug code in Visual Studio Code

Create the Debug Configuration

• Open a folder using File -> Open Folder…. The configuration will be tied to his folder, to use it again we need to open the same folder.
  
• On the left side select the Debug button and click the down arrow next to the RUN AND DEBUG drop down
  
• Select the Add Configuration option
  
• Add a configuration to the launch.json file

For Node.js React Remix web site

    "configurations": [
        {
            "name": "Run MY_WEB_APP with npm run dev",
            "command": "npm run dev",
            "request": "launch",
            "type": "node-terminal",
            "cwd": "/THE_WEB_APP_DIRECTORY_PATH"
        },
        ...
    ]

Start debugging

To run a configured application in debug mode

• Open the same folder you used to create the Debug Configuration
• On the Debug tab click the down arrow next to the RUN AND DEBUG drop down
  
• Select the Debug Configuration
  
• Click the Start Debugging arrow
  

Stop debugging

To stop the debugging process

• On the Terminal tab hover above the running Debug Configuration item and click the trash can icon
  

Cities: Skylines II (also known as Cities: Skylines 2) makes tram line creation much easier.

To add a new stop to an existing tram line

• Place a new stop
  
• Select the Tram Line Tool and drag the existing tram line to the stop
  
• The bent line shows, the tram will stop there
  
  

To move a tram stop to the correct side of the road

If the tram stop is not at the desired side of the road

• Delete the tram stop with the bulldozer
  
• Create a tram stop at the correct location
  
• Select the Tram Line Tool and drag the existing tram line to the stop
  
• The bent line shows, the tram will stop there
  
  

To delete a tram stop

To delete an existing tram stop

• Select the bulldozer and click the stop
  

TypeScript (and JavaScript) functions can only return one value, but that value can be an object. To return multiple values from a function, we can return those in an object.

There are two ways of returning an object from a TypeScript function:

Create an object in the function, set the property values and return it

Create an array inline in the return statement. (An array is an object.)

In this example the first element is a string, the second is a number.

function myFunction(): [string, number] {
    return ['Monday', 1];
}

let [a, b] = myFunction();

Async functions

Async functions return promises, so we need to add it to the return type declaration.

async function myFunction(): Promise<[string, number]> {
    return ['Monday', 1];
}

let [a, b] = await myFunction();

Use curly braces

We can use curly braces to enclose the return values, but don’t forget to surround the entire expression with parentheses.

function myFunction(): [string, number] {
    return {'Monday', 1};
}

let ( {a, b} = myFunction() );

Async functions

When an async function returns multiple values in curly braces, we don’t need the parentheses around the entire call expression.

async function myFunction(): [string, number] {
    return {'Monday', 1};
}

let {a, b} = await myFunction();

In Cities: Skylines II (also known as Cities: Skylines 2) we can build a deep open pit stone and coal mine.

Terraforming

• Place a mine in the selected area
• Extend the mine area to the circular border
• Build a temporary road around it to mark the maximum mine area
  
• Bulldoze the mine
• Terraform a pit in the middle for the mine building
• Terraform a spiral path to the bottom of the mine four times wider than the gravel road
  

Road construction

• Place a mine at the bottom of the pit. Click the right-mouse button to rotate the building.
  
• Place a straight gravel road segment at the front of the mine.
  
• Build a gravel road from the mine to the surface road on the spiral surface.
  
  
  

Mine area creation

• Stretch the mine area between the road segments.
  
• Continue the area definition up to the surface.
  

These are some of the important features of Cities: Skylines II (also known as Cities: Skylines 2) released on October 14, 2023. This post is a work in progress, check back for more details as my city grows.

Special thanks to Biffa for the great examples at Our Cities Skylines 2 Journey Starts Now! Are You Ready? and Cities Skylines 2 Autumn & Winter Make Your City Look Amazing!

Configuration

There are some configuration settings which make game play more enjoyable. Select Options in the main menu

Autosave

Enable Autosave on the General tab

Using multiple monitors

When your computer has multiple monitors, and you want to use the second one during game play to search the web, you need to be able to move your mouse pointer out of the game area. To be able to easily move the mouse to the second monitor

• On the Graphics tab set the Game cursor mode to Free.

Edge scrolling

Turn off Edge Scrolling on the Gameplay tab, so when we work close to the edge of the screen, it does not move the map.

Elevation dragging

Elevation dragging can cause unintended results, we can turn it off.

Unlimited money, Unlock all, Natural disasters

When we start a new map, we can enable and disable Unlimited money, Unlock all, and Natural disasters. To change these options later in the gameplay:

• In the Main menu select LOAD GAME
  
• Click the MAP OPTIONS button
  
• Select or unselect Natural Disasters, Unlock All and Unlimited Money
  

Increase and Decrease elevation keyboard assignment

Many laptop computers do not have dedicated PgUp and PgDn buttons. To make elevation change easier reassign these functions to the arrow buttons.

• During game time press the Esc key to open the pause menu
• Select the OPTIONS button
  
• To change the key assignment for the Decrease Elevation function, on the INPUT tab click the Page Down field
  
• On your keyboard press the Down Arrow key
  
• Repeat the process for the Increase Elevation function
  

Elevation dragging

If you are comfortable using elevation dragging, we can change the elevation of roads, tracks, pipes, and cables by dragging with the mouse.

• On the Advanced tab of the Input panel check Elevation Dragging.
  

File locations

The save and Player.log files are located at “C:\Users\%username%\AppData\LocalLow\Colossal Order\Cities Skylines II”

Maps

• Maps are five times larger, than the maps in Cities: Skylines I, scaling to 14.336 km x 14.336 km, divided into 441 map tiles.
• The buildable area is higher.
• Tiles can be picked up in a continuous fashion, or far from each other to create separated areas

Unlocking elements

In the new version of the game not the population size, but the infrastructure size unlocks new features. We can build a large city with roads, electric and water systems, and unlock new objects, like unique buildings.

Signature buildings

Industrial Signature Buildings are unlocked when a certain number of hub buildings are placed on the map.

These hubs don’t have to be operational, so we can unlock the signature buildings just by placing the hubs on the map.

Outside connections

Every map comes with at least an outside road connection. A new outside connection is automatically created, when network reaches the edge of the map:

• Road
• Train
• Air traffic
• Power
• Water

Roads

Road types

There are many new road types

• Alley
• Parking spaces

Road tools

• Snap to
  • Gridlines
  • Zone grid
• Grid tool to create grid of roads
  
• Upgradable roundabouts
• Sound barriers
• Parking lots

Road maintenance

If the roads are not maintained, citizens can suffer car crashes due to slippery roads.

Intersections

We can drop an intersection on an existing road and automatically make the connections.

Bridges

To build a realistic bridge with enough clearance for the traffic below,

Above a road

• Set the elevation of the bridge to 7.5m to leave enough clearance for vehicles below,
• Draw the ramp long enough to display at least 5 squares on the ramp.
  

Above train tracks

• Set the elevation of the bridge to 10m for enough clearance for the train tracks below,
• Draw the ramp long enough to display 6 squares on the ramp.
  

Above water ways

• Set the bridge elevation to 40m for large ships to be able to pass under it.
  

Building and modifying roads

To change the direction of a one-way street

• On the Roads tool select the Replace function,
  
• Hover above the road segment, hold the left mouse button and drag the mouse in the direction of the traffic.
  

Traffic management

• To remove traffic lights, select the traffic light icon and right-click the intersection.
  
• To add a sign, select the sign and left-click the location
  

Terrain

• When we select the terrain tool, the contour lines are displayed. The elevation difference between two thin lines is 1m, between two thick lines is 10m.
  

Key wall

Build the key wall

We can build a paved path with concrete sea wall and outlooks.

• Set the elevation step to low and build a pedestrian street in the water on at least 2.5m elevation.
  
• Build a pedestrian street where the outlook will be
  
• Place a small roundabout in the intersection
  

If the game does not want to build the roundabout that close to the water

• Temporarily level the dirt next to the intersection and place the roundabout.
  

Fine tune the key wall or any road

To precisely move the key wall use the Replace tool

• Select the Replace road tool
• Turn off Snapping for fine control
• Hover above the road segment, move the mouse to move the road and left-click to place it to the new location.
  

For more information see How to Build Amsterdam Style Canals | Inspirational Builds | Cities: Skylines II

Utilities

City streets, but not highways, now carry

• Water
• Sewage
• Electricity

Electric Power

There are many new electric power facilities and transmission line types.

Power transmission

• Traditional high voltage towers
• Low voltage lines for residential areas
• Underground electric power lines

Electric power transformers

For long distance power transmission use transformer stations

Selling electric power

If you generate more power than used by the map, connect the electrical system to the outside connection and sell the generated excess electricity.

Electric power supply through roads

To supply the city with electricity through the city streets

• Build a street close to the outside electricity connection
• Place a transformer next to the street
• Connect the high voltage power line outside connection to the transformer
  
  

Water

Now we can use ground water using ground water stations.

• Select the Groundwater Pumping Station to display the ground water reserves
  
• Build a street close to the reserve
• Place a Ground Water Pumping Station above the reserve
  

Sewage

Until the sewage treatment facility becomes available discharge the waste water into a river flowing away from your city.

• Select the Sewage Outlet. This will display the direction of the flowing water
• Place the Sewage Outlet on the shore
  
• Connect the outlet to the street
  

Pollution

Before placing any polluting services or industries, always check the ground water, and fertile land locations, wind and surface water current direction to make sure not to pollute sensitive areas.

Air, ground, and ground water pollution automatically clears after the pollution source is moved away. It takes a long time for the ground water pollution to disappear.

The surface water pollution only disappears, if the water currents can carry the pollution away. You can bury the surface water pollution with earth. The pollution will not be visible, but when you remove the earth, the pollution becomes visible again.

Trees

Trees grow very slowly. Plant them early in the city construction, so while the the population grows, the trees have enough time to grow too. When you place a sapling, a blue dotted line shows the final size of the tree when it fully develops. Overlapping trees clear each others, so don’t plant the trees too close to each other. To create a forest, plant the saplings, and let the game run for 12 hours for the trees to grow.

Brush tool

Use the brush tool to plant multiple trees and paint forests.

Roads with trees

There are roads types with trees on both, or only on one side of the road.

Zoning

New zoning options

• 6 residential zone types
  • Low income
  • Mixed commercial
  • Suburbs

Services

The available services are

• Communications
• Parks and recreation
• Transportation
• Emergency
• Power
• Welfare
• Police
• Fire

When placing service buildings, build parking spaces next to them for workers and visitors, and leave room around them for upgrades.

• Elementary school
  • Children’s clinic
  • Extra capacity
  • Playground
• High school
  • Extension wing
  • School library
  • Sports field
• Health care
  • Extension wing
  • Ambulance depot
• Fire house
• Police station
  • Garage

Road can be built later

Some services can be placed without road connection, we can build the roads later:

• Landfill
  
• Upgrade the dump area for more capacity
  

Industries

Stone mine

To build a realistic stone mine we cannot build a road in the mine, but we can terraform the mine area build the road, and flow the mine area around and between the roads.

• Leave room for the gravel road going in
  
• Terraform a lower level terrace for the road and build the gravel road in the gap
  
• Line up the edges with the road
  
• Continue with a lower level road foundation
  
• Build the second section of the road, but leave the area open to be able to bring the mine in between the roads.
  
• Update the shape of the mine
  

Mine building in the mine

We can even place a mine building in the middle of the mine.

• Terraform a flat area for the building a curved slope for the road, and place a Stone Mining industry at the bottom of the pit.
  
• Build a gravel road on the slope
  
• Clear some area in the middle of the mine next to the road
  
• Place the mining area next to the gravel road
  

AI and simulation

We can follow citizens:

• Select the person
• Click the follow icon
  

Economy

Budget

Loans

Taxation

By adjusting the the taxation we may be able to encourage certain industries to invest more in the city, hire more people and produce more.

The art of taxation

If nobody is complaining about the tax rate, it is too low. Keep the overall happiness, so people move in.

• Residential – 18%

Tax rates by zones and education levels

• Residential
• Uneducated
• Poorly educated
• Educated
• Well educated
• Highly educated
• Commercial
• Industrial
• Office

Services

Production

The Materials section shows the surplus/deficit of each raw materials. To reduce import, start producing or mining raw materials.

Industries with higher production deficit build first:

Certain industries need larger areas to build, like textile factories, so make sure the industrial zones contain large sections too.

When we designate the specialized industry area, like farms, the arc of the angle shows which side we are defining:

To adjust the area use the Specialized Industry Area Tool

There a more specialized industries:

On any land

• Livestock farming

On fertile land

• Grain farming
• Vegetable farming
• Textile fiber farming
• Forestry

• Stone mining is important for the upkeep of people’s houses.
• Coal mining
• Ore mining
• Oil drilling

Trading

We can trade through outside connections

• Electricity,
• Water and Sewage (build water and sewage pipes to the edge of the map),
• Road maintenance,
• Healthcare,
• Garbage management,
• Fire and rescue,
• Police,
• Education.

Progression

We can collect Expansion Points (XP) by

• Building
  • city service buildings and their upgrades,
  • signature buildings and
  • roads,
• Increasing the population and citizen happiness

When an XP threshold reached we progress to the next milestone and receive more funds. To see how many more Expansion Points are needed to reach the next milestone, hover above the Progression icon

Examples:

Roads

• Small roundabout – 10 XP
• Medium roundabout – 15 XP
• Large roundabout – 20 XP
• Very large roundabout – 25 XP

Signature buildings

• Pop musician mansion – 250 XP, +2 well-being within 500m

We can unlock signature buildings by

• Building 10 rock mines anywhere

There are 20 city milestones, each granting Expansion Permits to buy tiles, and Development Points to unlock advanced features and city services.

• Tiny village
• Small village
• Large village
• Grand village – 3,500 XP
• Tiny town
• Boom town
• Busy town
• Big town
• Great town
• Small city
• Big city
• Large city
• Huge city
• Grand city
• Metropolis
• Thriving metropolis
• Flourishing metropolis
• Expansive metropolis
• Massive metropolis
• Megapolis

Buildings can be upgraded

• High school with football stadium and athletic field

Expansion Permits

Use the permits to purchase additional tiles

Development Points

Use the Development Points to unlock advanced services on the tech tree. Click the Progression icon to open the tech tree panel.

Education

Roads

• Advanced road service let us add and remove traffic lights, road signs, crosswalks, sidewalks, grass, trees, street lights, sound barriers.
  

Game design

Colossal Order creates the PC and console version of the game, so all design decisions are made to maximize the experience on both versions.