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[Ozyton]

How do you get those things turned? I'd love to know how.

You can place solid fuel directly on things as if they were wings.

Also, this might help some people. You can click and drag the command module to move the ship around. Useful if you are building a taller rocket.

[breadbocks]

Wut. TO THE SHIP EDITOR!

[Aqizzar]

Managed a pretty low orbit, around 40k but without a means to deorbit. Happy suffocating.

So, orbiting actually works?  How did you make it happen?  Any time I try steering a rocket towards something other than "straight up" either the SAS's won't let me or it just goes out of control.

I've been wondering if those yellow and pink markers on the horizon ball actually mean anything, but steering towards those is inevitable disaster too.

[TheBronzePickle]

Orbiting does work. Getting an orbit is hard, though. With the power in the engines it's very easy to overshoot the orbit and end up drifting off into space. On the other side of the equation, overdoing engine control means that the rocket won't quite make it into stable orbit. Hopefully they'll include an orbit visualizer later on so that it's easier to tell if the rocket will make a stable orbit.

[Rakonas]

Managed a pretty low orbit, around 40k but without a means to deorbit. Happy suffocating.

So, orbiting actually works?  How did you make it happen?  Any time I try steering a rocket towards something other than "straight up" either the SAS's won't let me or it just goes out of control.

I've been wondering if those yellow and pink markers on the horizon ball actually mean anything, but steering towards those is inevitable disaster too.

There are two of each of the yellow and pink things; one for forward, one for reverse. The yellow is the direction in which the rocket is heading, as is visible in that if it's in the orange you're going down, and in the blue you're going up. The pink is.. I don't know.
Getting them both to be horizontal is pretty likely to get you in orbit though.
Also, turn off your SAS if you're trying to steer the rocket manually.

[Ozyton]

I think the tutorial said purple was the direction to the launch base zone act 1 pad.

[Bremen]

Orbiting is quite possible, and even easy once you get the hang of it. I can do it no sweat now (after many, very spectacular failures; the Kerbal system is doubtless littered with forgotten space pods that achieved escape velocity).

In fact, the numbers have been crunched on the size and gravity of Kerbal. You can find the results at https://gist.github.com/1073201

Format is height, required orbital speed, and escape velocity from the planet's gravity well. Remember that the orbital speed has to be horizontal relative to the planet below you (escape velocity can be in any direction that doesn't intersect the planet's atmosphere).

[vagel7]

I actually made a rocket fold into itself. The crew survived though and after the explosion the command unit was sitting nicely in the middle of the pad.

Also, where do you get those big yellow tanks?

[TheBronzePickle]

The big yellows are from the extra parts pack.

My question is: is there a way to add stuff in the middle of the rocket without having to rebuild everything that comes after it? I have several precision-placed side-connected rockets that I don't want to have to rebuild painstakingly.

[Virex]

You could remove the parachute and attach the underside of your rocket to the nosecone, although that may wreck havoc on any custom stage sequences.

[Aqizzar]

My question is: is there a way to add stuff in the middle of the rocket without having to rebuild everything that comes after it? I have several precision-placed side-connected rockets that I don't want to have to rebuild painstakingly.

NO, which is like, the top of the suggestion list for me, right under making side-parts less precision intensive.

[Ozyton]

I'm taking a guess here, but I suppose you could build those side connectors out then place solid fuel thanks on them, connect the parts you want to the fuel tank, remove wha toyu don't want, then put the pieces back.

[ThtblovesDF]

Reaching space isen't that hard. Reaching space with a workable spaceship that could possibly surive a landing anywhere however...

Obligatory space-di*k?*

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[Jay]

I pulled a successful orbit all the way around, but misjudged the retrograde burn and ended up landing just barely within vision range of the pad.
Oh well, close enough in my book.

[Deadmeat1471]

I pulled a successful orbit all the way around, but misjudged the retrograde burn and ended up landing just barely within vision range of the pad.
Oh well, close enough in my book.

Congrats Jaygagarin