In-Development Project A.L.I.C.E

PROJECT A.L.I.C.E
Artificial Limited Interface and Command Extension

(A free community driven Voice Attack / Voice Macro extension)
You can join the Project Here: Project A.L.I.C.E Discord

I'll get directly to the point. I love playing Elite Dangerous as much (if not more than) other commanders flying in the black. I started a passion project to reduce the learning curve and ship management for new players, and overall reduce the overhead of managing your ship for more seasoned players. A.L.I.C.E stands for Artificial Limited Interface & Command Extension. A.L.I.C.E's main goal is to help you enjoy the game while giving you active feedback to improve your understanding of the game mechanics, your actions, and help you get out of those tight situations.

What does A.L.I.C.E really do? Well under the hood she dynamically tracks the full game state as your playing and updates it. When you tell her to do something she then logically checks to see if she can complete the task then does one of two things. She does what you asked her to do, or she tells you she can't and why. She will also tell you if an action failed to complete. She gives you the ability to give her simple commands and she will figure out the Environment, Ship Status, Equipment Status, Panel Status, Pip Positions, and Fire Group Positions and will logically set up the ship in the state that your asking for. Simple example, your weapons are deployed, landing gear down, and cargo scoop is deployed... You say Supercruise (After completing environment checks) she will align the ship by retracting weapons, landing gear, and the cargo scoop and start charging for Supercruise. All from a single command so you don't have to worry about the little details.​

So if you read all the dangly bits up to this point you're probably wondering what "Community Driven" means right under the title. Well it is simple... You decided what gets developed and what features are focused on. Right now A.L.I.C.E is in the Open Beta stage so you can download the beta in the Discord (Link Above). I will be posting Videos showing some of the features adding more as I get them recorded. Enough of that chit chat below is some of the starting info. I will be posting some of the features but not all of them as there are many. To combat writing a novel on all of this I will post videos as I record them. Why? because who likes reading about something when they can watch it.

[video=youtube;SgzQAwlHaNU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgzQAwlHaNU[/video]​

Keep in mind that almost all these features are configurable, meaning that you can enable or disable them, on the fly or in advance.​


Features

Community Toolkit

[video=youtube;J4OFtK_c3e4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4OFtK_c3e4[/video]​

Advanced Targeting & Reports

You have the ability to give parameters for scanning targets. A.L.I.C.E will begin scanning all targets in range and report when any targets meet the requirements. You may enable one or all of the scan types in a single scan. Once a target is found A.L.I.C.E will lock on the target and follow on with reports.

Scan Types:

Wanted Targets - Will Report and maintain lock on Wanted Targets and Initial Bounty.
Hostile Factions - Will Report and maintain lock on Hostile Factions.
Detailed Scans - Will maintain lock on targets that have not completed a level 3 scan (full scan).
Subsystem Scans - Will scan all the target ships subsystems. (Will be adding in auto subsystem targeting)
Series Scans - Automated Logic based scan that will cycle though all targets and apply the above filters to each target.

(Video Demo Pending)


Ships Control

You have the ability to control almost everything on the ship.

Cargo Scoop
Silent Running
Landing Gear
External Lights
Hardpoints
Supercruise
Hyperspace
Discovery Scan
Shield Cells
Throttles (Down to 5% steps)
Series Boosting (Up to 20 Times in a row)
Chaff Launcher
ECM
Heatsink
Fighter Deployment: (Both Bays and Either the Player or NPC)
Power Controls
Fire Group Controls
Full Panel Controls
All Fighter Orders
Remote Mothership Control (With NPC on board)

Many more complex combinations of the above which include Normal Running Mode, Defense Mode, Landing Preps, Docking Preps ect...

(Video Demo Pending)


Station Interactions

Interactions with stations have been streamlined and A.L.I.C.E makes it clear at the end of those long voyages when your tired if your docking permissions have been granted. No more flying into the station because you missed that the station was full... (not speaking from personal experience or anything). She will assist you in aligning your ship for docking, power management, and reduce the stress of bringing in those... more questionable goods. Because who enjoys trying to dodge that NPC ship that doesn't care you're there while disabling silent running, throttling down, deploying your landing gear to increase drag, and putting max pips to engines so you can avoid hitting the back of the station all at the same time? (I mean I enjoy it). Sometimes it would be nice to have someone there to help. Event if it is as small as sending a docking request for you when in range without being prompted...

Automated Docking Request
Prompted Docking Request
Dynamic Feedback on Docking Status
Automated Docking Preps
Prompted Docking Preps
Fully Automated Docking Procedures (Requires Docking Computer)
Station Reports
Station Hanger Entry
Opens Starport Services on Docking

and more...

[video=youtube;sXQ4dxz7jDI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXQ4dxz7jDI[/video]​

Advanced Fire Group Management

This is a large topic on its own. I'm going to scratch the surface with and example and leave the bulk of this to the video. Have you ever wanted to mount Four Shield Cell Banks, Leave them all online, and only activate targeted banks in combat on the fly? I'm sure most of you know that using the hot key for activating them in this case will result in the ability for you to cook breakfast on your dashboard. With A.L.I.C.E's Fire Group Management you have the ability to Order Individual Shield Cells in active combat and automatically return to your previous fire group to continue engagement within a fraction of a second. You even have the ability to pair Shield Cells with Heat sink Launchers and dynamically decide to use both or just one or the other. Want to launch a Heat sink and Shield cell? Simply say "Cold Shield Cell Two" and she will Activate Shield Cell Two and the Assigned Heat sink.

While using the Combat Power Management system you can give commands that shift where defensive/attack power is allocated, how much power to assign to weapons, ect...

Enable / Disable Combat Power - Allows users to enable and disable the system.
Light - 2 Pips to Weapons
Balance - 3 Pips to Weapons
Heavy - 4 Pips to Weapons
Maintain Engines - Leftover Power to Engines
Maintain Systems - Leftover Power to Systems
Systems/Shields - 3 1/2 Pips to Systems, 2 Pips to Engines, 1/2 Pip Weapons
Engines/Thrusters - 3 1/2 Pips to Engines, 2 Pips to Systems, 1/2 Pip Weapons

A.L.I.C.E will not change powerstates with out the users input. The user can switch between attacking and defending powerstates by voice command or by button command.

(Video Demo Pending)

I will continue to add more information to this post about the Project as more questions are asked. If you have things you would interested in seeing please let me know.

Development Team:
Project Lead: Shadow Doctor K
(Its a lonely job...)

If your interested in joining the project feel free to message me and we can talk. This project was started for the community, and should be developed by the community. My goal is to release the full code for community development once out of beta. New team members are always welcomed :)
 
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Would the Alice commands be available through button prompts rather than voice prompts? I love the sound/feel of it, but I can't use voice operated software. It would be awesome if I could replace my normal key binds for this and let ALICE perform the procedures after selecting them from my MFDs.
 
Would the Alice commands be available through button prompts rather than voice prompts? I love the sound/feel of it, but I can't use voice operated software. It would be awesome if I could replace my normal key binds for this and let ALICE perform the procedures after selecting them from my MFDs.

Yes, all the commands are run though the plug-in so you would be able to activate them using button press' vice voice activation. A.L.I.C.E uses the keybinds from game so there are many easy solutions to allow you to run both the commands and keep your normal keybind setup right now.
 
When will this be available to test?

I'm currently working with the Beta testers finishing up some of the final items on the to-do-list. Once complete I'll release the Voice Attack version first. The version released for Voice Macro will be a little bit after the Voice Attack version. I'd give a time frame but thats honestly hard to pin point. I work 12 hour days when i'm needed at work then work on A.L.I.C..E in my spare time. I'll at least say I'm aiming to release A.L.I.C.E in the new few weeks.
 
Looks like a great work in progress. Having used voice attack this goes beyond its capabilitie, my voice attack is messed up from the last update and I went back to key commands. I would be interested, very interested, in this
 
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