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StarStrider v2.8 : What's New

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• It is now possible to add new planets & satellites so that you can construct your own new (fantasy) solar systems. This is all done via new StarLua extensions. Our own solar system is of course defined in same way (see the file “Solar system bodies.StarLuaLib”) so that you can completely customize it if you want!
  
  
• It is now possible to run multiple simultaneous StarLua programs.
  
  
• Added a two-page on-screen help box (for controls & commands). Toggle it by pressing F1.
  
  
• Now surface feature names, constellation names, sky object names and planetary names are all translated into your selected language.
  
  
• A new option, ”Use Latin names”, turns off the above mentioned name translations in case you prefer the Latin ‘scientific’ names.
  
  
• The “Select next/prev in solar system” commands has been replaced with the following commands: “Select prev sibling object” (Alt+Left key), “Select next sibling object” (Alt+Right key), “Select parent object” (Alt+Up key), and “Select first child object” (Alt+Down key). This allows you to fully navigate the selection throughout the whole “solar systems -> planets -> satellites” hierarchical tree.
  
  
• Added an “Add Kuiper belt objects” StarLua program (in the 'Scripts & Views' directory) that adds several recently discovered Kuiper-belt objects.
  
  
• Added “from your current position” and “from currently selected object” options to the “Find all stars within” function.
  
  
• The clock display has moved to the right hand “info stack” and is now labeled “Time:”.
  
  
• The “Save preset” command has migrated from the File menu to the “View->Quick presets” menu. But that's not all, presets are now saved in the “Presets – View” subdirectory and are selectable on the “Quick presets” menu - i.e. you can customize those as you see fit.
  
  
• Keyboard shortcuts have been reorganized and improved (e.g. object type toggles are now on the number keys instead of Alt + Number key and the latter is now used for name toggles).
  
  
• The “Numeric /” key now slows down the time scaling by a factor 10x and the “Numeric *” speeds up time by a factor 10x (these new keyboard shortcuts replace all the previous time-scale short-cuts).
  
  
• The mouse back/forward navigation buttons now toggle the main menu - useful if you're running in full-screen mode without keyboard attached...
  
  
• You can now pause the program at (almost) any time using the 'Pause' key on the keyboard.
  
  
• Several minor improvements and bugs fixes.
  
  
• StarLua improvements:
  
  
  • Added several new functions & variables to ‘star’ sky objects: n = planets, obody = getplanet(n), obody = addplanet(sname, vaxialradii, ppath), rotationaxis = vaxis, mass = n, radius = n, atmosphereheight = n
    
    
  • Added many new functions & variables to ‘body’ sky objects: n = satellites, obody = getsatellite(n), obody = addsatellite(sname, vaxialradii, ppath), n = features, ofeature = getfeature(n), setsurfacemap(smapname, sflags), setalbedomap(smapname, sflags), setheightmap(smapname, nheight), setspecularmap(smapname, nlevellimit), setcitymap(smapname, nstartyear, nfullyear, sflags), setcloudmap(smapname, nheight, nrotfactor, sflags), setringmap(smapname, ninner, nouter, nalbedo), setatmosphere(nheight, nblend, rgbtint, rgbhalo, rgbsky), coord = vpos, rotation = nrad, rotationaxis = vaxis, mass = n, albedo = n, bvclr = n, axisradii = vaxialradii, kuiperbelt = b
    
    
  • Added functions used to create orbital paths: world.newstockorbit(sname), world.newkeplerorbit(), world.newuserpath(vpos).
    
    
  • Added ul, lr = observer.view.getvpextent() function to retrieve the coordinates of the upper-left & lower-right screen corners.
    
  
  What was new in v2.7