So what's all this about then?
Currently, when playing a game with Space Exploration and most other mods that add new resources, those new resources only spawn on Nauvis. This is awkward with, for instance, the ATOM modpack, which has many added resources and adds some very high production requirements to complete the game.
Unfortunately, this is impossible to fix externally due to Factorio engine limitations; once the surface is created for a planet (or asteroid belt, or whatever), it's resource generation settings are effectively fixed.
This mod fixes the problem.
No way, that's impossible.
Yes, I did say that. It turns out, there's a workaround. But it's a bit janky.
Every time SE creates a new surface (with certain exceptions), this mod creates an 'echo' surface with identical terrain, but the only entities that spawn are the missing resources. Then it copies them to the real surface. And then the echo surface just sits there, invisible to the player (unless you use editor), nothing much happening.
That sounds scary. Are there any side effects?
Beyond slowing down chunk generation, there shouldn't be. Since only resources that should be on the surface (according to SE's own universe generation process) but are not are spawned, no resource that shouldn't be present will appear, nor will existing resource patches double in size.
(I'm sure you're very disappointed.)
Since biter nests are notably not generated, there should be no performance impacts after generation; save files will grow somewhat, but since there's not much on the echo surfaces it shouldn't be too extreme. And because it isn't allowed to overwrite existing entities, it shouldn't have any impact on $SPOILERS.
You don't sound entirely confident about that last part.
Life is risk.
Sounds like fun. Can I add this to an existing game?
Yes! However, on it's own, the mod only take effect on newly generated surfaces (including ones that are deleted and recreated).
To update an existing surface, use the command /semrs_create_echo while on that surface. Expect significant lag. Also, the map will not update on it's own - to see the newly spawned resources you'll need to either visit them, view the area in the satellite view, have radar coverage, or some other such map-updating activity take place.
And what if this gets a proper fix sometime down the road?
If, when a surface is created, this mod sees that there aren't any resources missing from the original surface, it will recognize that it's not needed and not create an echo surface, while continuing to augment generation for existing surfaces as needed. And should you disable this mod, any newly generated chunks on surfaces with echoes won't have the added resources, but already generated chunks will be unaffected.
Are you sure this is safe?
Mostly? I'm confident in it's behavior under typical circumstances, but there may be edge cases that I'm not aware of. I recommend saving before viewing a surface for the first time.
Known Limitations (?) / Issues
If you use Space Exploration's "trim surface" function and then explore the deleted areas again, the mod resources won't come back. Since it's arguably a bug that they normally would, I have no interest in trying to change this.
On rare occasions, core seams will spontaneously seal during chunk generation. This should not be an issue in most cases, but when applied to an existing surface might destroy core mining drills. Why the code that is supposed to prevent resources from being copied into the space occupied by a core seam isn't always working is still under investigation.