Sensors

The senors are the eyes of a ship, a station or a colony.

There are two kinds of sensors, the CRS (Close-Range-Sensors) and the LRS (Long-Range-Sensors).

CRS

Icon
They only show you what is on the same field as the object you are currently managing.

Shown things are the names of the other objects, the classes, their owner, their current status (condition of the hull/shield) and a bunch of options. Those options allow you to transfer goods and crew, attack the object, scan it or to send the owner a message.

LRS

Long range sensors (LRS) of a ship.

Icon
Based on the senso range of the ship, you can see further or not. Every ship or station has at least on field of range.

The map you will see when the LRS is active shows the objects on it like planets, nebulas and asteroidfields. It also shows you the borders of the nations and some other interesting information. (Foes = Red, Friends = Green, You = Yellow, Public = White)

At the moment (2014-08-16), the LRS is required to be active if you want to move your ship.