Elite Observatory - Search your journal for potentially interesting objects, or notify you of new ones on the fly while exploring!

[Vithigar]

Here you go:

That bug should've been fixed a while ago. What version are you running? Can check in the details tab of the exe properties window. Newest version is 0.4.19.315.

 

[Heavy Johnson]

I was going to screenshot, but GIMP doesn't seem to like to do sub-window dialogue boxes of Explorer very well.

It's version 0.4.19.315. Exact size is 957,440 bytes.

 

[Vithigar]

Got it, just reproduced myself no problem. Strange that no one else has brought it up.

I'll have it fixed in the next release.

 

[varonica]

Remarkably for the second time in a few days I find myself getting a near ring warning for an asteroid belt.

It's a brown Class IV gas giant on an elliptical orbit to the ring, but as chance has it I have arrived at a fortuitous time when it is at its closest approach to the asteroid belt.

So I worked out which was the closest belt cluster to the planet and headed there. Strangely it was a bit of a chase, I got to a certain distance and even with throttle on 100% I couldn't get closer, it appeared to be moving away as fast as I was approaching. With a bit of judicious pointing away and back and juggling speeds I finally managed to drop into the cluster, and I should point out not near the asteroids, in them with one shooting just past the shoulder of my ship, my journey nearly ended right there!

The question was asked earlier, can you get some decent pictures of planets from an asteroid cluster? I think these are a suitable answer, my only complaint is it wasn't a ringed gas giant, that would have been epic!

Spoiler

Fly safe all!

Of course just adding here, these seem to be the very first pictures of a planet or moon taken from an asteroid cluster, I have never seen any others, so this is not just a personal first, but a first for anyone........I am quite chuffed, have a beer on me all!

 

[Orvidius]

Got it, just reproduced myself no problem. Strange that no one else has brought it up.

At my job we deal with this sort of thing surprisingly often. It's like "How did this EVER work? And why hasn't anyone complained about it before? It's been like this for years." LOL

 

[Heavy Johnson]

At my job we deal with this sort of thing surprisingly often. It's like "How did this EVER work? And why hasn't anyone complained about it before? It's been like this for years." LOL

Then it becomes a "feature" and you'll get complaints when you patch the problem....

 

[Baxder]

Orbital offset definitely not working. Any ideas? (EDIT: Or, I should say, what am I doing wrong this time?)

Spoiler

<Criteria Comparator="And">
<Criteria Comparator="Greater Than" Value="0">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">Parent:Rings</FirstValue>
</Operation>
</Criteria>
<Criteria Comparator="Greater Than" Value="30">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">OrbitalInclination</FirstValue>
</Operation>
</Criteria>
<Description>Offset Ring Orbit</Description>
<Detail>
<Item>DistanceFromArrivalLS</Item>
</Detail>
</Criteria>

Here's the journal entry for the moon and its parent:

Spoiler

{ "timestamp":"2019-12-15T05:21:32Z", "event":"Scan", "ScanType":"Detailed", "BodyName":"Xothaei SZ-F d11-7 3", "BodyID":41, "Parents":[ {"Star":0} ], "StarSystem":"Xothaei SZ-F d11-7", "SystemAddress":248982377827, "DistanceFromArrivalLS":1759.276123, "TidalLock":false, "TerraformState":"", "PlanetClass":"Sudarsky class IV gas giant", "Atmosphere":"", "AtmosphereComposition":[ { "Name":"Hydrogen", "Percent":72.640419 }, { "Name":"Helium", "Percent":27.359577 } ], "Volcanism":"", "MassEM":3362.317627, "Radius":66396832.000000, "SurfaceGravity":303.985901, "SurfaceTemperature":890.070068, "SurfacePressure":0.000000, "Landable":false, "SemiMajorAxis":527070199808.000000, "Eccentricity":0.001408, "OrbitalInclination":0.056463, "Periapsis":197.818405, "OrbitalPeriod":208355440.000000, "RotationPeriod":755657.812500, "AxialTilt":-1.808912, "Rings":[ { "Name":"Xothaei SZ-F d11-7 3 A Ring", "RingClass":"eRingClass_Rocky", "MassMT":2.1993e+12, "InnerRad":1.3136e+08, "OuterRad":5.2154e+08 }, { "Name":"Xothaei SZ-F d11-7 3 B Ring", "RingClass":"eRingClass_MetalRich", "MassMT":1.3097e+13, "InnerRad":8.2526e+08, "OuterRad":1.3204e+10 } ], "ReserveLevel":"PristineResources", "WasDiscovered":false, "WasMapped":false }

{ "timestamp":"2019-12-15T05:21:41Z", "event":"Scan", "ScanType":"Detailed", "BodyName":"Xothaei SZ-F d11-7 3 a", "BodyID":44, "Parents":[ {"Planet":41}, {"Star":0} ], "StarSystem":"Xothaei SZ-F d11-7", "SystemAddress":248982377827, "DistanceFromArrivalLS":1700.884888, "TidalLock":true, "TerraformState":"", "PlanetClass":"Icy body", "Atmosphere":"thick argon rich atmosphere", "AtmosphereType":"ArgonRich", "AtmosphereComposition":[ { "Name":"Nitrogen", "Percent":99.007126 }, { "Name":"Argon", "Percent":0.990071 } ], "Volcanism":"minor nitrogen magma volcanism", "MassEM":0.411589, "Radius":6332907.000000, "SurfaceGravity":4.090410, "SurfaceTemperature":139.636047, "SurfacePressure":902127.125000, "Landable":false, "Composition":{ "Ice":0.875234, "Rock":0.104549, "Metal":0.016952 }, "SemiMajorAxis":20960372736.000000, "Eccentricity":0.000000, "OrbitalInclination":40.065639, "Periapsis":195.408127, "OrbitalPeriod":16469162.000000, "RotationPeriod":16470233.000000, "AxialTilt":0.275265, "Rings":[ { "Name":"Xothaei SZ-F d11-7 3 a A Ring", "RingClass":"eRingClass_MetalRich", "MassMT":3.6711e+07, "InnerRad":1.074e+07, "OuterRad":2.5896e+07 } ], "ReserveLevel":"PristineResources", "WasDiscovered":false, "WasMapped":false }

 

[malenfant]

What's an "offset ring orbit" supposed to represent? Looks like you just want to show a moon with a high orbital inclination? What does that have to do with rings? (rings never have high inclination anyway, they should all be in the planet's equatorial plane)

 

[Baxder]

What's an "offset ring orbit" supposed to represent? Looks like you just want to show a moon with a high orbital inclination? What does that have to do with rings? (rings never have high inclination anyway, they should all be in the planet's equatorial plane)

I want to show moons of ringed bodies with high orbital inclinations because they provide rare and unique photographic opportunities; you get to see the rings from such moons.

 

[Heavy Johnson]

I'm trying to write my own criteria. I assumed the bit below would give me any body greater than 1 earth mass, but it's not doing so. Why?

edit: nevermind, didn't have custom criteria toggle on. derp.

 

[Heavy Johnson]

So this doesn't work, but both of the nested Criteria do work....

<Criteria Comparator="And">
            <Criteria Comparator="Greater" Value="1.0">
                <Operation Operator="None">
                    <FirstValue Type="EventData">MassEM</FirstValue>
                </Operation>
            </Criteria>
            <Criteria Comparator="Greater" Value="1.0">
                <Operation Operator="None">
                    <FirstValue Type="EventData">Age_MY</FirstValue>
                </Operation>
            </Criteria>
            <Description>Greater than 1 EM and 1 MY</Description>
            <Detail>
                <Item>MassEM</Item>
            </Detail>
</Criteria>

Edit: Discovery - Log does not keep Age_MY for planets, only for star objects. If using Age_MY and you want planet, you have to use Parent:Age_MY. The planets should all be the same age as the orbiting bodies.

 

[Heavy Johnson]

The Custom Criteria checkbox seems to turn itself on and off randomly. Or at least unpredictably; I've had it be on and then off, and not noticed. Does it turn itself off if detecting an error in the file?

The application remembering where my logs are would also be nice.....

 

[Heavy Johnson]

Attached is a first pass at a custom criteria file for detecting galactic record-setting bodies. It covers all the planets, but no stars (yet). Using the current EDSM data it should detect any bodies that are new records in terms of mass, size, or surface temperature. Some of the bodies do not have detection for lower mass or surface temperature; planets of 0 K somehow exist, and earth masses < 0.00 EM. I might pull more detailed data out for those super-low masses and add them. Also note in some cases I have rounded up by a whole number (1.0) to make sure detection properly occured.

Please feel free to review/suggest.

 

[Heavy Johnson]

It had not even occurred to me that an asteroid belt would ever trigger a close ring proximity check, that's actually kind of incredible.

I'm not surprised that you can't see any asteroid clusters from the planet, but do you perhaps get a good view of the planet from any clusters?

I'm of two minds as to whether or not I should prevent that check from triggering on asteroid belts. It's probably not every going to be visually interesting, but it does seem noteworthy. Thoughts?

In general it seems that the game considers asteroid belts to be rings, the log shows it that way....

StarType":"F", "StellarMass":1.148438, "Radius":762974144.000000, "AbsoluteMagnitude":4.174454, "Age_MY":6502, "SurfaceTemperature":6415.000000, "Luminosity":"V", "RotationPeriod":286091.812500, "AxialTilt":-0.049108, "Rings":[ { "Name":"KOI 100 A Belt", "RingClass":"eRingClass_Metalic", "MassMT":1.3812e+14, "InnerRad":1.4104e+09, "OuterRad":2.527e+09 } ] }

On one hand, having a ring check for stars is helpful, we actually want to find those. On the other hand, actual rings and not asteroid belts are super-rare and really obvious when you jump in. I think this is going to need the app to pass on the actual ring data so we can choose to filter on the name or class.

 

[Heavy Johnson]

Trying to figure out a check to see if a body is a star. Can't use PlanetClass for obvious reasons, so trying to filter on a field that only exists if the object is a star. StellarMass is one of those. This would be easy if an 'Exist' operator was present, returning true if the field was there and false if not. But it's not, so various things I tried....

This does not work (and I didn't really expect it to):
<Criteria Comparator="Less" Value="0.0">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
</Operation>
<Description>Not A Star</Description>
</Criteria>

Nor does this:

<Criteria Comparator="Equal" Value="0">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
</Operation>
<Description>Not A Star</Description>

</Criteria>


And this caused an application crash:

<Criteria Comparator="Not">
<Criteria Comparator="Greater" Value="0">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
</Operation>
<Description>Not A Star</Description>

</Criteria>
</Criteria>

as well as this:

<Criteria Comparator="Not">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
</Operation>
<Description>Not A Star</Description>

</Criteria>

 

[Vithigar]

In general it seems that the game considers asteroid belts to be rings, the log shows it that way....

StarType":"F", "StellarMass":1.148438, "Radius":762974144.000000, "AbsoluteMagnitude":4.174454, "Age_MY":6502, "SurfaceTemperature":6415.000000, "Luminosity":"V", "RotationPeriod":286091.812500, "AxialTilt":-0.049108, "Rings":[ { "Name":"KOI 100 A Belt", "RingClass":"eRingClass_Metalic", "MassMT":1.3812e+14, "InnerRad":1.4104e+09, "OuterRad":2.527e+09 } ] }

On one hand, having a ring check for stars is helpful, we actually want to find those. On the other hand, actual rings and not asteroid belts are super-rare and really obvious when you jump in. I think this is going to need the app to pass on the actual ring data so we can choose to filter on the name or class.

Exposing more ring data for custom criteria is already planned.

Trying to figure out a check to see if a body is a star. Can't use PlanetClass for obvious reasons, so trying to filter on a field that only exists if the object is a star. StellarMass is one of those. This would be easy if an 'Exist' operator was present, returning true if the field was there and false if not. But it's not, so various things I tried....

This does not work (and I didn't really expect it to):
<Criteria Comparator="Less" Value="0.0">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
</Operation>
<Description>Not A Star</Description>
</Criteria>

Nor does this:

<Criteria Comparator="Equal" Value="0">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
</Operation>
<Description>Not A Star</Description>

</Criteria>


And this caused an application crash:

<Criteria Comparator="Not">
<Criteria Comparator="Greater" Value="0">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
</Operation>
<Description>Not A Star</Description>

</Criteria>
</Criteria>

as well as this:

<Criteria Comparator="Not">
<Operation Operator="None">
<FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
</Operation>
<Description>Not A Star</Description>

</Criteria>

Your third one works, but the description element needs to be in the outermost criteria block.

    <Criteria Comparator="Not">
        <Criteria Comparator="Greater" Value="0">
            <Operation Operator="None">
                <FirstValue Type="EventData">StellarMass</FirstValue>
            </Operation>
        </Criteria>
        <Description>Not a star</Description>
    </Criteria>

The first two fail because no value isn't zero, it's no value (null). In C# all comparisons against null values are false except "not equal".*

The final one fails because all the boolean criteria (and/or/not) require other criteria as their arguments. An error here is correct, though I could stand to improve the details given to the user.

* Personally I prefer SQL's handing of NULL as "unknown", but maybe that's just me.

 

[Pirin]

Attached is a first pass at a custom criteria file for detecting galactic record-setting bodies. It covers all the planets, but no stars (yet). Using the current EDSM data it should detect any bodies that are new records in terms of mass, size, or surface temperature. Some of the bodies do not have detection for lower mass or surface temperature; planets of 0 K somehow exist, and earth masses < 0.00 EM. I might pull more detailed data out for those super-low masses and add them. Also note in some cases I have rounded up by a whole number (1.0) to make sure detection properly occured.

Please feel free to review/suggest.

This is very nice, thanks for compiling this criteria list. I downloaded and will test. But one bug question in my mind: how it will get updated? Looks like it is a static list on the local PC and will become outdated regularly when new records are discovered.

 

[Baxder]

Attached is a first pass at a custom criteria file for detecting galactic record-setting bodies. It covers all the planets, but no stars (yet). Using the current EDSM data it should detect any bodies that are new records in terms of mass, size, or surface temperature. Some of the bodies do not have detection for lower mass or surface temperature; planets of 0 K somehow exist, and earth masses < 0.00 EM. I might pull more detailed data out for those super-low masses and add them. Also note in some cases I have rounded up by a whole number (1.0) to make sure detection properly occured.

Please feel free to review/suggest.

How about gravity records?

 

[Heavy Johnson]

The first two fail because no value isn't zero, it's no value (null). In C# all comparisons against null values are false except "not equal".*

I kind of assumed this was the case, but was hoping for an internal "convert null to zero" since there is no check for existence or "NOT NULL" at the moment.

The NOT Greater than 0 check worked correctly after moving the description field, thanks for that catch.

 

[Heavy Johnson]

This is very nice, thanks for compiling this criteria list. I downloaded and will test. But one bug question in my mind: how it will get updated? Looks like it is a static list on the local PC and will become outdated regularly when new records are discovered.

Has to be updated manually. Fortunately the updates to these records are unusual and infrequent. If these change more than once a month or two months, I'll be shocked. Perhaps in some future date Elite Observatory would be able to remotely pull the data, but that seems to be quite outside the scope of the app at the moment.

How about gravity records?

Doable, along with Surface Pressure per body. For stars, absolute magnitude, stellar mass, radius, and surface temperature are currently trackable. It just takes more time, and that XML file already took me a while.....