Confusion abounds

[MerlinRedbeard]

First off, I'm brand new to the game, so some of these things might be due to inexperience and failed perception checks.

The Andor gave the mission of acquring terraforming specs, but it was not available in the Andor world menu and then I gave them spacefaring tech without thinking about it.  Afterwards, I was unable to complete the mission.  I tried going to buy these specs at the other planets I unlocked and the black market, but nothing appeared, and there was no option within the Andor planet.  Is this what is supposed to happen in this scenario?  If not, what was supposed to happen?

I have just received the "Freighter Distress Call" mission, but no planet has any options regarding the mission, and there is no other ships on the map other than those circling planets.  Am I missing something here?

I also have the mission that the Boarine hae a secret proposal to gain spacefaring tech, but when I visit their planet, I cannot complete the mission in the way I'm expecting. 

I'm chalking a lot of this up to the fact that this is my first attempt at this game, so feel free to point out what I'm doing wrong.  I'm running v2.013 on Windows 7 with Kaspersky and a crappy wired internet connection.  I have an i7 with a GTX650 graphics card.

[Captain Jack]

Hi Redbeard,

That problem bugged me forever until I realized that you access quests by clicking on the alerts directly. Right there at the top of the screen! I'd actually forgotten how frustrating I'd found that at first, I got so used to it...

[MerlinRedbeard]

Ah, that makes much more sense, thank you!  Was that somewhere in the tutorial?  I lost before I could even finish it

[TheVampire100]

I stepped in exactly the same trap. But it isn't that hard to find out that you have to click on ot that they have to cover it in the tutorial.
On the other hand, a single sentence about it wouldn't hurt.