Structure¶

The root of all kOS data types.

Overview

Overview ¶

All types of data that a kOS program can access, either via a variable, or a suffix return value, or really just any expression’s temporary result, are now directly or indirectly derived from this one base type called just Structure.

That means that there are a few generic suffixes that you should be able to use on any value anywhere. This page documents those suffixes.

This is true even of primitive value types such as 1.0 or false or 42 or "abc". For example, you can do:

print Mun:typename().
Body   // <--- system prints this

print ("hello"):typename().
String // <--- system prints this

print (12345.678):typename().
Scalar // <--- system prints this

structure Structure¶

Suffix	Type	Description
`TOSTRING`	`String`	The string that gets shown on-screen when doing the PRINT command.
`HASSUFFIX(name)`	`Boolean`	Test whether or not this value has a suffix with the given name.
`SUFFIXNAMES`	`List` of `strings`	Gives a list of all the names of all the suffixes this thing has.
`ISSERIALIZABLE`	`Boolean`	Is true if this type is one that works with WRITEJSON
`TYPENAME`	`String`	Gives a string for the name of the type of this object.
`ISTYPE(name)`	`Boolean`	true if this value is of the given type name, or is derived from the given type name
`INHERITANCE`	`String`	Gives a string describing the kOS type, and the kOS types it is inherited from.

Structure:TOSTRING¶

Type: String
Access: Get only

When issuing the command PRINT aaa., the variable aaa gets converted to a string and then the string is shown on the screen. This suffix universally lets you get that string version of any item, rather than showing it on the screen.

Structure:HASSUFFIX(name)¶

Parameters

name – String name of the suffix being tested for

Return type

Boolean

Access

Get only

Given the name of a suffix, returns true if the object has a suffix by that name. For example, if you have a variable that might be a vessel, or might be a Body, then this example:

print thingy:hassuffix("maxthrust").

would print True if thingy was a vessel of some sort, but False if thingy was a body, because there exists a maxthrust suffix for vessels but not for bodies.

When searching for suffix names, the search is performed in a case-insensitive way. Kerboscript cannot distinguish “:AAA” and “:aaa” as being two different suffixes. In kerboscript, they’d be the same suffix.

(Note that because a Lexicon can use a special Lexicon suffix syntax, it will also return true for suffix-usable keys when you call its HASSUFFIX method.)

Structure:SUFFIXNAMES¶

Type: List of strings
Access: Get only

Returns a list of all the string names of the suffixes that can be used by the thing you call it on. As of this release, no information is shown about the parameters the suffix expects, or about the return value it gives. All you see is the suffix names.

If this object’s type is inherited from other types (for example, a Body is also a kind of Orbitable.) then what you see here contains the list of all the suffixes from the base type as well. (Therefore the suffixes described here on this very page always appear in the list for any type.)

Note, for some objects, like Vessels, this can be a rather long list.

The list is returned sorted in alphabetical order.

Example:

set v1 to V(12,41,0.1). // v1 is a vector
print v1:suffixnames.
List of 14 items:
[0] = DIRECTION
[1] = HASSUFFIX
[2] = ISSERIALIZABLE
[3] = ISTYPE
[4] = MAG
[5] = NORMALIZED
[6] = SQRMAGNITUDE
[7] = SUFFIXNAMES
[8] = TOSTRING
[9] = TYPENAME
[10] = VEC
[11] = X
[12] = Y
[13] = Z

(Note that because a Lexicon can use a special Lexicon suffix syntax, it will also include all of its suffix-usable keys when you call its SUFFIXNAMES method.)

Structure:TYPENAME¶

Type: String
Access: Get only

Gives the name of the type of the object, in kOS terminology.

Type names correspond to the types mentioned throughout these documentation pages, at the tops of the tables that list suffixes.

Examples:

set x to 1.
print x:typename
Scalar

set x to 1.1.
print x:typename
Scalar

set x to ship:parts[2].
print x:typename
Part

set x to Mun.
print x:typename
Body

The kOS types described in these documentaion pages correspond one-to-one with underlying types in the C# code the implements them. However they don’t have the same name as the underlying C# names. This returns an abstraction of the C# name. There are a few places in the C# code where an error message will mention the C# type name instead of the kOS type name. This is an issue that might be resolved in a later release.

Structure:ISTYPE¶

Parameter name: string name of the type being checked for
Type: Boolean
Access: Get only

This is True if the value is of the type mentioned in the name, or if it is a type that is derived from the type mentioned in the name. Otherwise it is False.

Example:

set x to SHIP.
print x:istype("Vessel").
True
print x:istype("Orbitable").
True
print x:istype("Structure").
True.
print x:istype("Body").
False
print x:istype("Vector").
False
print x:istype("Some bogus type name that doesn't exist").
False

The type name is searched in a case-insensitive way.

Structure:INHERITANCE¶

Type: String
Access: Get only

Gives a string describing the typename of this value, and the typename of the type this value is inherited from, and the typename of the type that type is inherited from, etc all the way to this root type of Structure that all values share.

Example:

set x to SHIP.
print x:inheritance.
Vessel derived from Orbitable derived from Structure

(The kOS types described in that string are an abstraction of the underlying C# names in the mod’s implementation, and a few of the C# types the mod uses to abstract a few things are skipped along the way, as they are types the script code can’t see directly.)

Structure:ISSERIALIZABLE¶

Type: Boolean
Access: Get only

Not all types can be saved using the built-in serialization function WRITEJSON. For those that can, values of that type will return True for this suffix, otherwise it returns False.

Structure¶

Overview¶

Overview ¶