Introducing... USD type 1 *updated*

[Valiant70]

Honestly, I really like the whole idea behind this and I think it can be made to work in a cosmetically pleasing way with some creativity and sliding pieces. However, I suggest that the rail and docker be placed at the top and bottom rather than the sides to allow for more conveniently placed activation logic. This also solves the problem of building the things with left/right symmetry and ending up with one backwards/upside down. The blocks at the left and right sides of the port should be considered "reserved" for controls and/or signage.

 

[Krougal]

On a more serious note, yes I'm all for a standard. I watch this discussion with some interest, although I'm still not grasping a lot of how this is going to work.

 

[EricBlank]

The proposed docking mechanism matches the one I'm already using almost perfectly, but we're going to need more coordination when the magnetic-only docking comes along.

Right now I'm just assuming that a hermaphroditic docking port is going to have to extend out from the hull and have a little space between the collar and airlock, and it's going to need the most specific planning.
A female docking collar would likewise need to extend out from the hull. It can be set on a rail that extends/retracts the docking collar on demand. The reason it's female is that it needs to possess the rail basic blocks to dock to in order to accept other craft, so you're docking a big craft to a little craft on a rail to another ship, which might pose problems when docking extenders come into play again, which I assume will be used to allow a craft to accept something with a lower than 1:1 mass of parent:child docking situations.
A male port needs a rail docker block, and can be flush with the hull or extended by solid hull; the game won't let us chain dock with two parents, though, so we can't have a male port that extends outwards to dock to a port on the other craft. That would require it to be docked to two entities simultaneously, or you'd be using a female port and the other craft would inevitably have to dock to you.

With the female port you can put a rail on each of the compass directions, such that you can choose which direction is the most ideal orientation by moving the child ship around.

 

[mindlord0013]

Honestly, I really like the whole idea behind this and I think it can be made to work in a cosmetically pleasing way with some creativity and sliding pieces. However, I suggest that the rail and docker be placed at the top and bottom rather than the sides to allow for more conveniently placed activation logic. This also solves the problem of building the things with left/right symmetry and ending up with one backwards/upside down. The blocks at the left and right sides of the port should be considered "reserved" for controls and/or signage.

The problem with placing the docker and basic at the top/bottom of the collar, is that you dock your ship upside down relative to the target. There may be updates to it soon, in collaboration with jath

 

[Valiant70]

The problem with placing the docker and basic at the top/bottom of the collar, is that you dock your ship upside down relative to the target. There may be updates to it soon, in collaboration with jath

Why didn't I think of that? Well, you could still move the docks one meter down to allow controls in the middle.

 

[jath]

We're going to do a comprehensive series on different configurations, and then put it to a vote. The winning design will then be submitted to the council to deliberate on, and hopefully will become the universally accepted standard. When reviewing ships or placing them into the starmade dock community comment, it will be noted weather the design is usd docking compliant.

There will likely also be standards for different sized ships as well, such as fighters and top/bottom hatch connections. Those will probably come later though since i think terminal style docking is a priority.

That isn't to say that you can't do what you want, but accommodating universal standards in your designs would make your ship more versatile, and able to dock more places that you didn't necessarily build. It will also make proprietary systems more interesting and challenging to deal with for those that wish to go that route. Don't want anyone but certain people to dock? Proprietary designs might be for you. I personally can't think of any reason for propriety, other than profit in the real world, but maybe you can.

As a final point, it would be great to see more ideas submitted on the usd system so we can investigate them and present them.

 

[Jake_Lancia]

Thank you for the new standard! The update's been out for little over an hour (at time of posting) and already I have began incorporating the USD Type 1 docking collar into Trident's larger ships.

Spoiler: Images and link

The USD collar I have created for my Fast response Quantum vessel.

...And that's it docked to my WIP station.
LINK to new update of FRQ

Trident Industries fully endorses this standard! Let's hope it becomes the primary one!

 

[Krougal]

Jamster0000 I thought you were retiring the Quantum :p
I look forward to your new dock too, since I'm still not getting the moveable collar. Downloading Bench's X-Wing and ripping it at least got me started understanding (I hate sitting through videos but I can reverse engineer almost anything I get my hands on).

KDY endorses this standard (or really just any standard, as long as we can have a standard).

Spoiler: KDY CSV with USD-1

Now that we're all happy what about a standard for small craft? Stuff without airlocks. Say for like hangars. Front, back, left, right? On landing gear or not?

 

[Jake_Lancia]

Jamster0000 I thought you were retiring the Quantum :p

I still am retiring the Quantum series, I just wanted to future proof the latest ones, and besides, that FRQ is really my first foray into rail docking anyway. It was just the first ship I had laying round in my SP :P

 

[Krougal]

I still am retiring the Quantum series, I just wanted to future proof the latest ones, and besides, that FRQ is really my first foray into rail docking anyway. It was just the first ship I had laying round in my SP :p

That's good. The Quantums and Hyperion were among some of the first ships I downloaded and played around with so I still have a certain fondness for them.

So seriously, curious what people are thinking for small ships and drones.

 

[Keptick]

That's good. The Quantums and Hyperion were among some of the first ships I downloaded and played around with so I still have a certain fondness for them.

So seriously, curious what people are thinking for small ships and drones.

No idea for small ships. As for drones I'm sure that the good chaps over in the drone R&D thread would agree that you can't really have a universal dock since drone sizes and function vary so much. When you add internal/external docking into the mix It'd be a nightmare. The problem is that you ideally want to stuff as many drones as possible in a small space. Doing so without custom racks for each drone model is pretty impossible.

I personally have a standardized rack size for my titan, but it probably wouldn't fit in most ships considering that it's >300m long.

Ps: jath "we" ?

 

[EricBlank]

Drones and small singleships are not going to be easy to set up a standard for, unless the standard is simply to assume they can dock flush with a flat surface, like a hangar floor, and include a few rails-suspended-on-a-pedestal or suspended catwalk, perhaps, for the odd-one-out that can't dock to a flat surface.

You wouldn't necessarily be too concerned with having your drones/fighters compatible with other peoples' carriers, though, would you? May be good to have a standardized shuttle dock, or say the standard for shuttles is to be a USD port somewhere on the craft so it can dock to any other craft that uses the USD. This assumes a shuttle with some sort of interior space that can mount a 3x3 access hatch.

3x3 access tunnels are my standard on smaller vessels anyway, and I already put what is effectively identical to the USD on the last couple ships I prepared before visiting this thread, so this is fairly easy to fulfill for me; continue with the course.

 

[Ithirahad]

This is already happening... Already happened, actually. :p

 

[Thalanor]

iCruiser is compatible only with 4G USD types 22a, 22b and 23. USD type 25 also works, but only if you buy the USD 22a/b to 25 adapter (separately available). :p

As much as the xkcd comic is true, there are enough people using USD type 1 now that I will equip my ships with it in the hopes that most stations and ports will be forced to at least also have an USD 1 port, and my own stations will always provide that one.

 

[Fireshock]

The problem with placing the docker and basic at the top/bottom of the collar, is that you dock your ship upside down relative to the target. There may be updates to it soon, in collaboration with jath

That is NOT true. This setup and many others work perfectly fine.

I agree with Valiant70 that we should move docks to bottom. Because closer the docks are to each other, it's easyer to hide them while looking nice and it also allows for USD designs with gravity which don't have roof above them. So minimal USD could look like this or even without wedges.

 

[jorgekorke]

I'll have to do a massive shape redesign on my ships for that to work, so I might apply that, but will take time.

I plan to make the connector part rail-moved, because having those exposed on the ship is kinda ugly.

 

[Krougal]

Drones and small singleships are not going to be easy to set up a standard for, unless the standard is simply to assume they can dock flush with a flat surface, like a hangar floor, and include a few rails-suspended-on-a-pedestal or suspended catwalk, perhaps, for the odd-one-out that can't dock to a flat surface.

You wouldn't necessarily be too concerned with having your drones/fighters compatible with other peoples' carriers, though, would you? May be good to have a standardized shuttle dock, or say the standard for shuttles is to be a USD port somewhere on the craft so it can dock to any other craft that uses the USD. This assumes a shuttle with some sort of interior space that can mount a 3x3 access hatch.

3x3 access tunnels are my standard on smaller vessels anyway, and I already put what is effectively identical to the USD on the last couple ships I prepared before visiting this thread, so this is fairly easy to fulfill for me; continue with the course.

No idea for small ships. As for drones I'm sure that the good chaps over in the drone R&D thread that you can't really have a universal dock since drone sizes and function vary so much. When you add internal/external docking into the mix It'd be a nightmare. The problem is that you ideally want to stuff as many drones as possible in a small space. Doing so without custom racks for each drone model is pretty impossible.

I personally have a standardized rack size for my titan, but it probably wouldn't fit in most ships considering that it's >300m long.

It depends, yes more for shuttles. Racks of course would be a whole different matter.
To try to clarify a little (at work so can't make screenshots with what I mean), raildocker could be on any of the 6 sides of the ship, but then there is also the matter of position on that side...so say we went with the bottom...center? front center? front left? back right? etc.

Obviously you wouldn't be able to make a universal hangar, but something that is compatible with as many ships that fit as possible. Otherwise people may have hangars that are plenty large enough to fit a given ship, but won't be able to because of dock location incompatibility.

 

[CAPTAINZACH]

Probably going to make my own variation on this, which integrates many key features that people have complained about.

Essentially it will be similar to this "Standard", but with the docking items and the top and bottom, that way, those people who want their clamps to be flush with the door can have that, and still have semi-reasonable access to the buttons. Of course, several people will probably complain even about my system, and want their own system. It's the same thing with the "Starmade Standard" doorway. Some like a 2X3 or a 3X2 or whatever they really want. I'm not going to try to please everybody...just please most. So yeah, haters gonna hate, because Stuff.
I will be using my own "USD Type A" on my ships/stations, but all stations will of course have at least one "USD Type 1" port. Why? Because why not!

 

[NeonSturm]

Stations require MANY different ports -> Stations become big -> Stations become REAL stations.

So we just need a reason to build MANY of them and a REASON to NOT complain about different docking systems.


--- My opinion, as always ---

The proposed docking mechanism matches the one I'm already using almost perfectly, but we're going to need more coordination when the magnetic-only docking comes along.

Right now I'm just assuming that a hermaphroditic docking port is going to have to extend out from the hull and have a little space between the collar and airlock, and it's going to need the most specific planning.
A female docking collar would likewise need to extend out from the hull. It can be set on a rail that extends/retracts the docking collar on demand. The reason it's female is that it needs to possess the rail basic blocks to dock to in order to accept other craft, so you're docking a big craft to a little craft on a rail to another ship, which might pose problems when docking extenders come into play again, which I assume will be used to allow a craft to accept something with a lower than 1:1 mass of parent:child docking situations.
A male port needs a rail docker block, and can be flush with the hull or extended by solid hull; the game won't let us chain dock with two parents, though, so we can't have a male port that extends outwards to dock to a port on the other craft. That would require it to be docked to two entities simultaneously, or you'd be using a female port and the other craft would inevitably have to dock to you.

With the female port you can put a rail on each of the compass directions, such that you can choose which direction is the most ideal orientation by moving the child ship around.

Lemme see if I get things right:

That is NOT true. This setup and many others work perfectly fine.

I agree with Valiant70 that we should move docks to bottom. Because closer the docks are to each other, it's easyer to hide them while looking nice and it also allows for USD designs with gravity which don't have roof above them. So minimal USD could look like this or even without wedges.

I just want some design to be able to dock left+bottom of two ships without them being one along X and one along Z axis or similar.
I think following design is the best one (with bottom ones required, other rails optional?)

This way

 

[Jake_Lancia]

I've managed to create a USD Type 1 docking port that I think addresses everyone's concerns about side placement of rail dockers. Here it is:

Notice how I've made the docking collar three blocks deep, to allow the docks themselves on the side, lighting inside, and button and gravity placement. I believe that alleviates everyone's concerns. I personally will take to calling this design, USD Type 1b to allow distinguishing between the original type 1, type A (which CAPTAINZACH has already used) and this.

This will be yet another update on my FRQ to do now... goddamnit.