JavaScript Comes To Minecraft

mikejuk writes "JavaScript is the language of the client and it is becoming the language of the server. Now it seems set to be the language of Minecraft. ScriptCraft is a Minecraft mod that can be added to the game to allow the player to use JavaScript commands. Walter Higgins ported the Rhino JVM implementation of JavaScript in a few spare weeks over Xmas. Some additional JavaScript classes allow the construction of blocks making it possible to automate construction. It also provides a 'turtle like' drone class that makes it easier to move in 3D. It makes use of a fluent API to create a domain specific language for movement. As its creator says: 'Ultimately I think the ScriptCraft mod could be used to take building in Minecraft to a whole new level. With a full-blown language at the Player's disposal, it should be possible to create not just castles and forts but entire road networks and cities.' Most importantly of all, it not only pushes the boundary of Minecraft, it also provides a way to get kids who are already hooked on Minecraft to start learning JavaScript."

Comments

WorldEdit did it first...

[Anonymous Coward]

Pretty sure it had the feature of modifying the world using javascript.

Re:WorldEdit did it first...

[Nexus Unplugged]

That would be CraftScript, which yes, has been around for quite a while. It also uses Rhino.

Re:Java IS NOT JavaScript, you morons!

[The MAZZTer]

RTFS. Just because Java and JavaScript appear in the same paragraph doesn't mean someone is equating the two. This is a JavaScript engine coded in Java, hooked up to Minecraft.

Nerd antennae went up

[iluvcapra]

I saw the headline and half expected that someone had in fact implemented a Javascript interpreter with MineCraft.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[BlindMaster]

Same, I was so excited to see a JavaScript version of MineCraft. Thought it would be HTML5, and wonder how the memory and graphic would support it. However, it is more for automation or command line usage, using script command to create blocks.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[Fallingcow]

Javascript running via a 3D world written in Java would have a Lovecraftian madness-inducing quality. You'd take one look at it and start bleeding from the eyes while producing an inhuman scream, before vomiting up most of your internal organs.

I mean, either of those things (Javascript, or a 3D world written in Java) are capable of getting you half way there all on their own. Both cannot exist, yet they do. Even thinking of the two being combined is enough to PH'NGLUI MGLW'NAFH CTHULHU R'LYEH WGAH'NAGL FHTAGN **carrier lost**

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[Minwee]

No, that kind of thing only works in Dwarf Fortress.

The problem is that those damn Elephants keep stepping on the infinite strip of tape and ruining my Turing Megaproject.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[Anonymous Coward]

Both games can be used to build turing machines (discounting for the infinite tape here)

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[HaZardman27]

I think GP was saying he expected to see a Javascript implementation created within Minecraft using redstone circuits (there are folks who have created working CPUs using redstone circuits).

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[vlm]

I'd much rather see a java implementation using lots and lots of redstone. Then you could theoretically run minecraft on minecraft in infinite regression. This could cause the end of the world so I'd be careful.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[HaZardman27]

Remind's me of The Onion's World of World of Warcraft.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[Bigbutt]

"How did he type **carrier lost**"

"Perhaps he was dictating it."
"Shut-up"

[John]

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[Fallingcow]

I didn't intend it that way but it kind of works, since Lovecraft did that kind of shit all the time.

"The end is near. I hear a noise at the door, as of some immense slippery body lumbering against it. It shall not find me. God, that hand! The window! The window!"

Maybe if he weren't taking the time to write "The window! The window!" his odds of escaping would improve.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not the end of the world. It's the beginning.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[Anonymous Coward]

You may want to have a look at voxel.js
http://voxeljs.com/

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[DMUTPeregrine]

It's theoretically possible, but you'd have to mod minecraft to allow more than a 21x21 chunk area to be loaded at once, otherwise the computer won't have enough space to have enough memory.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[VortexCortex]

I'd much rather see a java implementation using lots and lots of redstone. Then you could theoretically run minecraft on minecraft in infinite regression. This could cause the end of the world so I'd be careful.

Oh No! Don't Tell the GCC developers! We're all be DOOMED!

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[davester666]

We'll be fine.

It'll be so slow, the Sun would envelope the Earth before this would cause the end of the world.

Re:Nerd antennae went up

[Vernes]

Using script to create blocks...

*dusts off LSL skills*
I knew I didn't waste 5 years of my life learning this.

You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

You can already do all this in Java. What is the benefit of exposing players to the wonder of javascript via minecraft vs exposing them to the wonders of java via minecraft? Either one is a POS.

I wish someone would do a C rewrite. People make excuses about the fully manipulable world and such but the reality is that there is nothing going on in minecraft that would make it tax a Pentium 3 without no gpu offloading had it been authored well in a decent language.

Don't get me wrong it's a great game and fun to play. The implementation just leaves a lot to be desired. Buggy as hell too but you can't blame that on the language!

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

You can already do all this in Java. What is the benefit of exposing players to the wonder of javascript via minecraft vs exposing them to the wonders of java via minecraft?

Well, for one thing, you can type Javascript statements into an interactive command line within the Minecraft game itself, which you can't do with Java.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[BenoitRen]

I don't like Java either, but don't hate on the JavaScript, please. It's running my MSN client on a Pentium II smoothly!

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[timeOday]

I'm delighted that Minecraft is in Java because my son plays it all the time, it's more constructive than other games, and it also happens to be just about the ONLY game that will run on our computer, because it's Linux. (Well, flash web games work too, and Club Penguin had a healthy run at our place... but I doubt Flash is what you are advocating).

OK, I realize there has been some variety of games over the years which were released for Linux like quake 3. But as for games on Linux that are actually currently popular, and which people playing on different OS can link up and talk to each other, there are extremely few.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[CastrTroy]

There's nothing inherently special about Java that makes it able to run games on Windows/Linux any more than C/C++. If the programmers set out to make a program that will run on both, it will run on both. If they just assume it will work on Linux, or have no intention of it running on Linux, then it doesn't matter if it's written in Java, C or .Net, it won't run on Linux.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is that Notch is an absolutely terrible programmer. It's not Java, it's the actual code, and you can find out as much by analyzing it.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[jones_supa]

I wish someone would do a C rewrite. People make excuses about the fully manipulable world and such but the reality is that there is nothing going on in minecraft that would make it tax a Pentium 3 without no gpu offloading had it been authored well in a decent language.

Even though it looks like just a blocky retro game, remember it's a completely dynamic world. There's a good amount of surfaces to draw and each block's state must be checked and maintained as they can be freely manipulated. Possibly a P3/1000MHz could just cut it though... I completely agree though that a C or, more likely C++ rewrite would be much appreciated.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[HaZardman27]

This. If you decompile the Java bytecode in Minecraft, you will see that it uses lwjgl (LightWeight Java Game Library) which uses JNI (Java Native Interface) to get access to native OpenGL objects. There's no reason why this couldn't have been done in a natively compiled language, except that Notch started Minecraft as a quick project.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm.... That doesn't count for much when you need to compile it for Linux, and developers generally don't. If it's written in Java, the developer often doesn't need to even care - and it's the users choice where they run it.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Pieroxy]

There's nothing inherently special about Java that makes it able to run games on Windows/Linux any more than C/C++.

Holy fucking Jesus Christ, you haven't learned much in all that time have you? There is a hell of a lot more in Java. I once saw a (server-side) project of about 100k classes go from Java 1.3 32bit on Windows to Java 1.4 64bit on Solaris without even needing a recompilation. The stuff just worked.

This is miles and miles away from what it would have meant in C or C++, and you know it. Of course, C and/or C++ done properly can achieve something that is portable, but at least your most common data type doesn't change whenever you change the number of fucking bits in your CPU. Not mentioning the stability of the APIs whenever you want to do anything vaguely more complex than fopen.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Bengie]

What I don't understand is how my CPU can be nearly idle running a server, while the server gets slow with too many things going on at once.

If a CPU is idle, the server should not be getting bogged down.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

Blah blah blah, archaic language, blah blah blah, if only developers were perfect... Christ this is getting old. You C/C++ fogies sure are a crotchety bunch.

Look - the world moved on. So sorry you haven't yet. But we're *not* going to get off your lawn so just deal with it gramps. Maybe you can go yell at the COBOL guys for a while...

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[CastrTroy]

Wrong. If the developer does not design/test the game on Linux, it won't run on Linux. Well, it might run on Linux but odds are it probably won't. You'd probably have better luck writing a game in C for Windows, and relying on WINE for people who want to run it in Linux.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[mark-t]

This.

It's not that it's impossible to write nonportable java, it's just that what's interesting about Java, particularly when you compare it to C or C++, is that you get that portability with practically zero extra effort.

Java is not unique in this regard... although to the best of my knowledge, most of the other languages that achieve the goal are script-based.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[jones_supa]

It's not that much about doing things in some traditional way but rather the speed difference between native and managed languages.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

Word's are hard for you, aren't they?

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

I'm sure Notch is but crap C is faster (and more efficient) than crap Java just like good C is faster than good Java, though crap C isn't necessarily faster than good Java (but sometimes is, Java is that bad).

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Mike Frett]

Without knowing your Computers Specs, please allow me to name a few popular games that run on Linux if you let me?. Of course you should know about Steam and the Humble Bundles I presume?. Here are a few from the Ubuntu software center, even though I use Xubuntu, which is an OFFICIAL version along with Kubuntu and Lubuntu.

Space Pirates and Zombies, RC Mini Racers, Torchlight, Oil Rush, 0 A.D., Heroes of Newerth, Spring RTS Engine (Many games!). Those are current and popular but there are Thousands more older and fun games; why limit yourself to only new things. Everything is there if you look for it, trust me I've been looking for a year in every nook and cranny. And lots more on the way =)

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Vintermann]

They HAVE done a C rewrite. The mobile version definitively, and I think the XBox version as well. Go ahead and join their superiority - and perhaps reflect on the fact that there are tradeoffs to the potential efficiency gains of a rewrite.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Vintermann]

That just means the CPU isn't the bottleneck. I don't know the details of how "real" minecraft servers are set up, but in general minecraft writes a lot of stuff to disk (since worlds get so big, and Java needs that memory for other things as well, it more or less has to).

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Zmobie]

No, not in this case. You must not be very familiar with java and its runtime. Java is DESIGNED to be extremely portable and is in fact one of the biggest reasons it was able to rise up and compete with C++ originally. I have ported many programs in java from a Windows Eclipse environment to a Linux native compiler and both of them produce virtually the same files, the compiled files actually ran on both environments without a recompile pretty much every time that I remember.

C++ on the other had can be a BEAST to try and port even trivial programs between Windows and Linux, and in my early college days proved to be a pain in the ass because we standardized all of our programs compilations to the gcc and g++ Linux compilers while I was used to doing a lot of my coding using either Borland or Visual Studios on a Windows machine (Visual Studios has its own weird flavors as it is, but even more generic compilers had nasty results).

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Zmobie]

C is also much more prone to fucked up pointer arithmetic and memory leaks. It is honestly probably better that it is written in Java if Notch is a bad programmer because at least you have a managed language so that the game doesn't constantly crash from some memory issue.

I will agree with you that normal performance yes, C absolutely wrecks Java, but good Java is at least decent considering it is a managed language. Hell, if someone were so inclined they can try to force some mock memory management by forcing garbage collection at critical times, but that gets kind of dangerous if overused because then you just kill performance even worse.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Zmobie]

Could be a number of things. Improper threading springs to mind immediately as many applications in the vein of how minecraft was developed do not use multi-thread expansion correctly. Over-use of memory is another considering how vast the spaces in minecraft are there may be some required disk writes server side and even if the implementation uses B-Trees and proper spanning those kinds of operations are extremely costly moving it from disk to active RAM and vice-versa. Without looking at the code or observing the game more closely (my nephew plays it a lot, but I honestly haven't looked into that much of it) I'm just throwing out initial impressions.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[aztracker1]

And what is the speed advantage compared to extra development effort? Is 2-3x the effort with 5-10% performance advantage? What about increased chances of bugs, complexity, maintenance costs?

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

You'd probably have better luck writing a game in C for Windows, and relying on WINE

You're an idiot.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

C and C++ can both be compiled for the JVM.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

The clear answer is for someone who isn't as shitty a programmer (maybe a student learning games programming in C or C++) to write a minecraft clone and open source it. Should be a fun project for someone with the time. Replicate the login interface so you still need to own the game to use it. Someone will write a bypass but you can do that already.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[cwebster]

Get Play On Linux http://www.playonlinux.com/en/, (your distro might distribute it). It comes with user contributed install scripts for a variety of games (from CD/DVDs, GoG, Steam, etc), which will download the version of wine with the best compatibility / least regressions for a particular title, install needed runtimes, do all the winetricks magic needed and install the games. I've installed a few old GoG games and some newer ones. I'm playing Skyrim through PoL now and it runs (with DLC, high rest textures, and a handful of mods) just fine. Give it a shot, even if you dont have a GPU that will run the highest end games, you can get most of the classics through GoG and install/play them with PoL.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[znrt]

the problem with minecraft is not that it is slow, but a resource hog, both on the client and the server. i haven't looked at the code, but this and the fact that a whole team hasn't been able in a couple of years to fix this points more at a deficient design than at a poor implementation. if the problem is the architecture, language differences matter a lot less.

that said, adding js to it is way cool, but ... rhino! oh my ...

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[H0p313ss]

C and C++ can both be compiled for the JVM.

Yes, but I hear it makes you go blind.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[stenvar]

I once saw a (server-side) project of about 100k classes go from Java 1.3 32bit on Windows to Java 1.4 64bit on Solaris without even needing a recompilation. The stuff just worked.

That level of portability and cross-platform compatibility is nothing special; C/C++ is the rare exception because it exposes so many unportable features and is so completely lacking in runtime error checking.

but at least your most common data type doesn't change whenever you change the number of fucking bits in your CPU.

C99 has int32_t and similar types. If you want guaranteed sizes, use them. However, that makes your code less future-proof, since a lot of people expect that with a bigger CPU, they can also process more data. When used properly, C/C++'s CPU scaling of types is the right thing to do. What C/C++ get wrong is the lack of error checking by default; but, then, so does Java.

Java is a better language for the masses than C/C++. But that's kind of like saying that being hanged is better than being poisoned.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Dasuraga]

I think you underestimate the quality of javascript (which is not the worst thing you could use as a scripting language, def better than using java of all things), and overestimate the role of Java in the "slowness" of the game. Just because the graphics look like they're from quake 2 doesn't mean that's all there is to it.

take Dwarf Fotress and try to play it on a P3. You might think it's running normally because it's hard to gauge speed in a text-based interface but... it's running really slowly. World simulation is computation heavy(probably a lot of cache issues too), no matter what way you cut it. Fun anecdote: my first experiences with DF were on a Pentium 3, and I played it like that for maybe a month before trying it on a fast computer. Boy was I in for a ride.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

"a whole team hasn't been able in a couple of years to fix this points more at a deficient design than at a poor implementation"

I'd contend that the design is just the first step of implementation (and the second, and the third, and the fourth). Maybe that is just semantics but I find that you aren't going to end up with a very efficient design if you don't stop and spend some time considering how you are going to implement it before you step back to the drawing board.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

...also happens to be just about the ONLY game that will run on our computer, because it's Linux... ...there has been some variety of games over the years which were released for Linux like quake 3...

Dude, you sound like you still live in year 2000 or sth... Look around once in a while.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Jesus_666]

The again the entire Minecraft modding scene exists because Java cen be decompiled relatively easily. I don't think that we would havs such an expansive modding scene if Minecraft were distributed as a regular binary. In fact it's the only closed-source game I know where people routinely write mods that replace parts of the engine itself.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[znrt]

i'd throw in that experienced chess players play better partly because they simply don't see the bad moves, and don't have to bother with them.

if you have to implement a design to see it's flaws, it's just lack of experience. of course you'll get there by iteration, eventually, but in the process you'll have accumulated some experience in the field, and won't repeat the same mistakes the next time.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Kirth]

I wish someone would do a C rewrite too. Just look at what this http://minetest.net/ does: "limited to +-31000 blocks in all directions" Hell, that's one big difference to 256 blocks...

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://minetest.net/

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have ported many programs in java from a Windows Eclipse environment to a Linux native compiler

How many of those were 3D games?

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Ash-Fox]

It is honestly probably better that it is written in Java if Notch is a bad programmer because at least you have a managed language so that the game doesn't constantly crash from some memory issue.

It's more likely than you think.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[quietwaters]

There is already a Minecraft clone called Minetest (http://minetest.net/). It's in C++ and is released under the LGPL.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Sedated2000]

There is also MCServer, which was written by a kid in college in his spare time, uses LUA scripting, and is now open source.

MC-Server.org

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[BobbyWang]

But then you are creating a game you usually never write all the code from scratch. Instead you base it on some game engine or game library (LightWeight Java Game Library in the case of Minecraft). If the game library works on a certain platform it's very likely that your game will too, if it was written with basic portability in mind and no unnecessary platform specific assumptions were made, At least it requires very little effort. Especially if it was tested on either OSX or Linux it will probably work on the other since they are almost identical (from a programmers point of view). With C++ you have to compile one binary for each target (OS/processor combination) apart from that it's not very different from Java in practice.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

There is some truth to that but just like the moves on the chessboard what is bad or not bad changes with the state of the board. If you live by experienced based mantras like the queen being a critical piece who must be protected at all costs, you might miss an opportunity to win the game by sacrificing the queen.

That's the curse of experience. What experience tells you is right 99% of the time so more and more you tend to rely on memory rather than analysis to find your answers. If you don't follow up experience based conclusions with at least a little active analysis your analytical skills will atrophy.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

"Java is DESIGNED to be extremely portable"

C was DESIGNED for the same reason. If you are doing a lot of platform specific specific stuff it is either poor design or an intentional tradeoff somewhere for performance and those bits should be abstracted so you can do the same thing for new platform. With java you lack the option to make that tradeoff. The Linux kernel is written in C. It runs on more platforms than anything I've ever written in any language and there are underlying bits written in ASM!

I would agree that most java apps are more portable because in most scenarios performance doesn't matter. When there is common hardware among the target audience that can't run the application performance does matter. This is a 3D game with some significant mechanics and performance matters here. C/C++ are still around for a reason despite easier and more rapid development in other languages and this is it.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

Java is script based too. It just saves the script in an intermediate compilation phase to save on loading performance. You can output byte code with the Perl interpreter as well to the same end.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

I'm not going to argue with that. Although I don't think there is any excuse for not doing your C/C++ properly so the benefit is mitigated somewhat.

This is a bit different though. This is a 3D game and performance is at least as important here as portability. A properly done and portable C/C++ is a better choice in this case than an easily portable but poorly performing Java implementation.

Every tool has its place.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

In this case you are probably talking about a 400% performance boost. I realize that in most applications performance isn't a critical factor but if you are writing non-trivial 3D games in Java you are either extremely ignorant or a moron.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[paulpach]

I wish someone would do a C rewrite. People make excuses about the fully manipulable world and such but the reality is that there is nothing going on in minecraft that would make it tax a Pentium 3 without no gpu offloading had it been authored well in a decent language.

Don't get me wrong it's a great game and fun to play. The implementation just leaves a lot to be desired. Buggy as hell too but you can't blame that on the language!

It is not a rewrite, as I have added a lot of things like quests, skill points, colored light, infinite up and down, teleporting, torches you can carry and 88 mobs while avoiding many of minecraft features. I did take inspiration from minecraft just like Notch took inspiration from Infiniminer. My game runs very fast in older machines (about 10x the framerate) and it even works in android and iphone. I wrote it in C# using Unity, you are more than welcome to try the free demo for each platform and chat with the fans in the web site if you need help. Block Story

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Zmobie]

To a degree I agree with that, but I was mostly letting the other poster know that just because a Java application was written for Windows originally does not mean it won't run on Linux, and in many cases will run without much additional work (if any). C you run into a lot of compiler/assembler issues because of it being a much lower level imperative language, and while implementations can be very abstracted with a lot of work, in the case of games and many application that are not necessarily just trying to interface with the hardware it isn't as easy to port.

I mean technically if one were so inclined they could probably write a lot of things that would port between platforms much easier in C or C++, but without more intimate knowledge of the compiler and assembler (which can be an absolute beating to look at for any language, much less something like C or C++ where there are a metric ton of add ons) it is difficult to predict how the logic will change when translated to machine code. Some things just lend themselves to be much more abstract-able (that isn't really a word but to hell with it).

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Zmobie]

This is true to a degree, but not all compilers were created equal in the case of C/C++. Java occasionally has that same come up but it is much more rare and usually isn't a big deal on the large platforms. I mean I can go write a simple 100 line program in Visual Studios right now, but it isn't going to run very well on Linux without some cajoling and a recompile on the gcc/g++ compiler. Hell, technically it won't even run on a Windows machine without the Visual Studios Runtime installed.

Depending on the compiler used, yes you can indeed write a program that is going to be fairly portable between the platform, but you trade off a lot of things for that and both system do not support the same things at the OS level so you don't have the same feature availability (it has been a while since I wrote targeting Linux but I think even some simple features have to be done two separate ways in Linux/Windows).

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Pieroxy]

In C/C++ you would have used an implementation of OpenGL which is only vaguely compatible with the Linux one. Of course, everything is supposed to work the same way, but really, it doesn''t. Yes, it is the fault of the shitty drivers on linux, but still, it's at best going to be a hit and miss operation.

Java3D might not be the cutting edge when it comes to 3D acceleration, but it really works all the same on all platforms where Java runs.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Zmobie]

Yea, if he has managed to run out of memory in Java, the game would have been UNPLAYABLE if he wrote it in C.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Ash-Fox]

Yea, if he has managed to run out of memory in Java, the game would have been UNPLAYABLE if he wrote it in C.

Minecraft never used bigint (was once a fairly big reason to use Java) in his code, which is why Minecraft corrupts it self, so, to imply he was using those nice Java specific features that avoided issues and crashes, you're wrong.

As for unplayable in C? I'm not really sure where you're getting that from - It's hard to imagine a similar implementation in C to what he did (not a real OO language). I suspect the that the lack of OO programming might have improved his understanding of what he was doing.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

Checkout minetest. It's an opensource clone done in C/C++. It runs 50 times better on my kid's netbook than Minecraft. It doesn't have all the zombies and minecarts and stuff, but the basic building is there. Runs on Win/Mac/Linux.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

C99 has int32_t and similar types.

Yeah, and the most popular C/C++ compiler on Win32 doesn't support C99.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[shaitand]

Cool. It doesn't seem to have redstone elements and creatures yet but definitely performs a lot better than minecraft. It really is a great start. I like the way it does blocks better, having them just pop in your inventory instead of falling to the ground. The 6 square crafting window instead of requiring a crafting table is also cool.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Zmobie]

I haven't honestly seen any of the code for the game so I don't know exactly what you are talking about in regards to his implementation. That said though, an OO implementation can be somewhat replicated in imperative languages like C, though obviously not the exact same since there are fundamental differences in the way things are handled. Hell, technically Java is not a true OO language even since it still heavily uses primitive types.

What I am saying is if he didn't even manage memory correctly in Java which is pretty brain dead easy, then he would have spent years trying to debug memory leaks and faulty pointer arithmetic that would have rendered the game basically unplayable. My comment isn't meant as he was intentionally using the features of a managed language to avoid issues and crashes, it is more that it is harder (not impossible obviously) to have serious memory related issue when writing something in a managed language like Java so it probably worked out for the better.

If a person writes crappy code in Java they will probably still write crappy code in C or other similar languages, but Java does have some training wheels type features to help with that. You could probably argue they are at least more likely to write crappy code in declarative, functional, or logic languages as well, but I have actually seen some people that just understood those paradigms better than OO programming (granted this is really rare). I don't completely fault the guy as memory management can be difficult to do properly in C (I believe it was Excel in the 90s actually had a memory leak in it that was never fixed until MS did the full Office redesign), but it is pretty strange he is actually causing memory related crashes in a Java application.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[znrt]

that's true too. and in contrast to chess in the sw game the board does change, and so do the rules. it seems sw is no game for old men! :-)

my point is that if you screw it up too badly at the initial design, you will need lots of iterations to sort it out. you'll may face situations where needed changes are so extensive/complex/impacting that you have a really hard time with them. minecraft seems to be such a case. just an impression, though.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Pherdnut]

People stopped writing everything in C for a reason. And no, as a primarily JavaScript developer I can assure you that it's not because the language is too hard for us mere mortals to understand. If you want full granular control to maximize performance for some 3D engine or version control, etc, you go with something like C that's basically a thin veil over assembly and pre-compiles. If you want it up and running tomorrow rather than 6 years from now and working in every relevant mobile device without actually testing in every single relevant mobile device simultaneously, you write it in JavaScript. Like most who know languages other than Java, however, I'll happily meet you in the middle and declare that Java sucks ass.

Re:You can do this in Java already?

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone's been working on a C implementation of the server at least. See https://github.com/Adam-/bedrock

They have it backwards...

[Zontar The Mindless]

Most importantly of all, it not only pushes the boundary of Minecraft it also provides a way to get kids who are already hooked on Minecraft to start learning JavaScript

No, most importantly for my kid, it has the potential to get a highly JS-capable dad interested in Minecraft (a diversion he has hitherto managed to avoid).

However, whether this be a good thing or a bad one is a matter that's entirely up for debate. :)

Re:They have it backwards...

[Anonymous Coward]

Thats boring.

There actually is a mod that includes fully functional 6502 computers.
While they do come with a basic operating system and Forth you could get your kids to write their own process schedulers and operating systems in assembly :P

http://integratedredstone.wikispaces.com/Redpower+Control

Re:Java IS NOT JavaScript, you morons!

[Anonymous Coward]

Read the article you fucking moron.

Re:Java IS NOT JavaScript, you morons!

[Zmobie]

RTFS. Just because Java and JavaScript appear in the same paragraph doesn't mean someone is equating the two. This is a JavaScript engine coded in Java, hooked up to Minecraft.

Couldn't have said it better myself. It boggles the mind how many don't realize languages can target different run time instances and that *gasp* compilers sometimes are just layered language implementations. One of my college professors wrote a prolog compiler entirely in Java that was a very good compiler actually. Hell if one were so inclined, they could write a C# application that targets a JVM instead of the .NET framework.

Why wont JS just go away

[cod3r_]

Maybe it's just me, but there are so many elegant languages they could have gone with. Maybe a JS engine is easy to implement, but the thought of even using it just makes me shiver. It's a recurring problem though. Unity has JS like language too and people are dead set on using it. Oh well. Better that python i guess.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Elgonn]

Until every browser supports LUA I'm not sure how you'd get Javascript to go away. There are very few (non-primary/embedded) scriptable engine languages. Besides with all the recent development Javascript is probably the best one.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[jones_supa]

Why better than Python?

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[vlm]

Does python still use whitespace as part of control flow structures? Ugh. I don't want to be the guy who posts the equivalent of "mysql doesn't have transactions" over and over in 2013, but I can't be bothered to keep up with a language I don't use, either.

It is however a fact that Python at least USED TO BE in a really bad neighborhood, sandwiched in between COBOL and FORTRAN in the "compiler really cares a lot about whitespace" ghetto, even if they've fixed it since then. I'd rather write a million parenthesis in LISP.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[larry bagina]

Haven't fixed it, won't fix it.

>>> from __future__ import braces
File "", line 1
SyntaxError: not a chance

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[rk]

Yes, python does still use the "whitespace thing" and no it's not that big a deal, and until I learned Python 12 years ago, I felt as you did. There are good reasons why as programmers we have almost genetic revulsion at syntactically or semantically significant whitespace, but python enforces with whitespace pretty much what as a good programmer you're doing anyway, which is consistently indenting your code. Most people don't even notice it after an hour, your editor will do it for you, and in my case, at least, it made me a better programmer in other languages because I cared more about proper indenting after learning it.

Comparing it to the fixed column parts of COBOL, FORTRAN and RPG would be vaguely akin to saying that JavaScript and C are the same because you use semicolons to terminate code lines. The ONLY thing python really has in common with those early languages is whitespace. The reasons for the whitespace are completely different.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[caseih]

Ha well you can keep lisp then. Python I'm a white space ghetto? To funny.

I found Eric s Raymond's take on python very interesting. He started out with your attitude but very quickly changed his mind once he actually started using it. Look it up. It's worth a read.

I've used both lisp and python. There's no comparison. Python is easy nicer. But it has a lot of lisp like features that make it a real pleasure to use. I'd prefer python over JavaScript any day. I was very sad the epiphany browser abandoned python as s plugin language in favor of JavaScript which didn't even have decent gtk bindings at the time. Ah well.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[am 2k]

Unity has JS like language too and people are dead set on using it.

In my experience, everyone who's serious about game programming in Unity3D uses C# anyways.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[HaZardman27]

If that's the only thing you can find wrong with Python, then I think that speaks much more good about the language than bad. When I first started playing with Python, I got tripped up a few times about inconsistent use of tabs vs spaces, but I have vim configured to take care of that for me now. Even if I want something fast or low-level, I will typically compile a shared object file for some C code, and then wrap it up in Python with Python's ctypes API. This gives me a good trade-off of the performance and predictability of compiled C and the ease-of-use of Python for more trivial code.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, my editor (emacs) will do it fine for me (spaces only). I just can't get over how, whenever I want to modify anybody else's code (who uses tabs, and clearly sets them to a value I don't), I have to mash C-q C-I to keep my code in line with theirs, or else risking the guy who submits a reformatting patch. I don't mind having to tiptoe around other people's styles for submitting patches, but I do mind having to tiptoe around other people's styles to get the program to run.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Isaac Remuant]

It's a feature, not a bug.

I'm sure the parent poster will hate Go as well but I feel this language design decisions ultimately do much more good than harm.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Anonymous Coward]

but python enforces with whitespace pretty much what as a good programmer you're doing anyway, which is consistently indenting your code.

Eh? I haven't done that in years. IDE does it for me. Why would I care about doing that?

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Jaxim]

Don't worry. You're not alone. I wish JavaScript would either mature or be replaced by another language: i.e. Google's DART.

The problem is that there is a huge crowd of developers who know JavaScript and like anyone in the human race, they don't like change and would like to see the status quo.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[dririan]

Your emacs configuration doesn't let you match other people's coding styles easily, so you blame the language? Sure, Python does require more consistency than most other languages, but if you "don't mind having to tiptoe around other people's styles for submitting patches", how on Earth do you format your code like the existing code if your editor is so broken?

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Vintermann]

Apropos Lua... this isn't the first pl-in-a-block mod. Lua was first.

(It also isn't an acronym, and we are past the day when all programming languages were named in ALL CAPS).

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[aztracker1]

So use an intermediate language like CoffeeScript.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[pjt33]

It's not just that a JS engine is easy to implement: it's that it comes as standard as part of Java (since Java 6).

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Jaxim]

I wouldn't be able to convince my manager to such intermediate languages. No, not until such things get more popular with JavaScript developers and managers.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[H0p313ss]

If that's the only thing you can find wrong with Python, then I think that speaks much more good about the language than bad.

Agreed, the whitespace thing is pretty much my only complaint about Python.

I don't script everyday, but when I do script and I can choose the language, I script in Python.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[MechaStreisand]

CoffeeScript has a pretty serious flaw that the author is too stubborn (or perhaps too dumb) to recognize as being a flaw.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Pherdnut]

So it's just an accident that it beat out all other contenders on the client-side web and is rapidly spreading to mobile, the server-side and pretty much any place we feel like implementing it. Have you seen a typical web dev team? Would you say the UI devs typically outnumber the server-side or that in 99% cases there's really just "a" JavaScript dev responsible for the HTML, CSS, and JavaScript handling all of the UI and layout concerns for the app while like 2-4 guys handle model and controller?

So yeah, I don't know. We must just be plucky I guess. But it couldn't possibly have anything to do with the fact that you wouldn't know a first-class function if it asynchronously bit you on the ass just because JS doesn't work exacly like the one c-based syntax language you know, could it?

And that language... It wouldn't happen to be Java would it? I mean why Dart? Why not Java for the front end?

Oh that's right, they already tried that. FFS, just TRY it without static types and classes for a few seconds. You might learn something. I know I learned more about JS when I actually bothered to learn other languages. And if you really only know one single c-based language, try something that's not first so you can get over that and think in terms of design rather than what you've learned by rote.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Pherdnut]

CoffeeScript basically cuts JavaScript's balls off in terms of the level of dynamic/granular control it gives you in terms of how you might want to implement OOD. And yes, people who have been writing code that normalizes for multiple interpretations of the actual code they're writing in, tend to be a bit fussy about adding another !@#$ing layer/dependency to the development process. Especially one that makes it more difficult to debug straight out of the environment the code is actually running in which is kind of a massive win. I find Python-style syntax refreshing. I don't like hamstrung JavaScript.

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Jaxim]

I think you might want to take off your sarcastic mode.

This is just my opinion, with which many agree. I have used JavaScript as well as other languages and I prefer the languages that have strict typing, built in class model, inheritance, interfaces, etc. I find it is easier to debug and maintain code in other languages. Sure, you can code in a similar fashion in JavaScript as you do in other languages, but because some of the coding elements are not built into JavaScript, the similar coding practices may be technically hacks. And because these coding practices are not standard across the industry, everyone on your team may not be practicing the same coding practices.

Anyway, that is just my opinion. Obviously you feel strongly opposed to my opinion.

I just feel that it would benefit everyone if JavaScript was revised so it learned from other languages and included at least a few of the features from other languages.

   

Re:Why wont JS just go away

[Pherdnut]

But that's the !@#$ing point. Why would you even look at another language if it's like all other languages? And yes, I'm a little touchy about it because as I've started becoming more of a generalist I'm starting to understand why people gripe about JS and it's never for good reasons. When I have to write some Java or C#, I don't come to those paradigms with the notion that the first thing to do is to concoct something foolish that will make those languages a lot more like JS, yet I consistently have to deal with that attitude when walking into client-side code-bases slopped together by devs who couldn't be bothered to learn anything new beyond what little they learned about the language they used the most in college.

I personally find classes overwrought and inelegant but I get why they're like that given a pre-compiled, statically-typed approach to things. Static types are a language design trade-off. They help languages perform better. Period. They do not protect you from the kinds of issues you're going to run into in any language when you're not conscious of the flow of data through your app, although given some of the complete crap I've seen on the server-side, I'm not surprised so many people seem to think they need all the protection they can get.

Dynamic types are handy because they help you do a whole hell of a lot more with a lot less code. I don't have to rewrite functions to overload my arguments, for instance. There's a reason typical web dev teams consist of a bunch of server-side guys and one or two UI devs and it's not because funneling data around and handling sessions is hugely complicated compared to what we have to do with JS, two markup languages, management cultures which have been spoiled rotten by how fast we can tweak and change UI and layout nowadays and 6-20 different platforms that don't always agree on what your code actually means. Confusing type errors? Never been a problem for me. Maybe I'm just a really awesome developer. Or maybe that's just a myth originating from extremely shitty code. Or maybe it's a hell of a lot easier to be cognizant of flow of data through your app when there's a lot less app necessary to get something done in the first place. XML config for actually branching anything other than external dependencies? How the hell did that happen? Which brings us to performance. I've never seen a poorly-performing Python back-end. PHP is up and down. Rails and .NET post-webforms too. Java server-sides are notorious, however. We all know who has the better benchmarks, but why in my 6 year career has every single Java server-side I've run into sucked complete ass? Because web apps are stupid-complicated? Just think about it.

Oh and JS had inspiration from other languages but the quoted inspiration for it is Scheme, a Lisp variant. JS didn't pull first-class functions and prototypal inheritance (thumbs up by the way, does everything I need it to) out of its ass. So yes, it's different. Different for a lot of good reasons. Different for not inspiring the kind of code that leads to people using 6 XML config files just to build one page of HTML. Do yourself a favor and try some of the weirder languages. Those rubber tires might look funny to you compared to good old reliable rock but sometimes it really is a great idea to re-invent the wheel.

Nothing New

[Anonymous Coward]

The Rhino engine has been part an optional extension of the very popular WorldEdit mod for ages. This isn't anything new.

Re:Java IS NOT JavaScript, you morons!

[SJHillman]

I believe they were referring to the fact that JavaScript is executed on the client and this usage of it is moving it to the server-side... not that the client is written in JavaScript. Go drink some coffee and turn your brain on.

xbox360 port

[vlm]

I would imagine this will primarily serve to ostracize the xbox port even further away from mainstream minecrafting.

Re:xbox360 port

[HaZardman27]

No more than any other mod which is only available for Minecraft on PC (which I assume is all of them, but I've never played the Xbox version).

I am amused

[Windwraith]

I find it amusing that this is news but what about LuaForge? It allows you to do Minecraft stuff in Lua, a language that can't be easier to learn, and is also pretty fast out of the box.

sounds like an earlier thread...

[QuietLagoon]

kids who are already hooked

Sounds like the earlier thread about a guy who wanted to get his wife hooked on (a.k.a., addicted to) video games just as he was....

Re:sounds like an earlier thread...

[VortexCortex]

It's much easier to get folks hooked on Minecraft, just show them how to craft heroin.

Re:Java IS NOT JavaScript, you morons!

[Anonymous Coward]

"JavaScript is the language of the client and it is becoming the language of the server. Now it seems set to be the language of Minecraft."

translated : "Javascript is a language that is often used in client side programs, and increasingly is used in server side applications. And soon it may also be usable within minecraft." Hell the second sentence makes it pretty clear that the first sentence isn't even talking about minecraft.

Re:Java IS NOT JavaScript, you morons!

[Anonymous Coward]

Please disarm some of those hair-trigger hang-ups (java != javascript!!!11) you have acquired. Indulging that stuff is bad for you and drives people away; a consequence you may not yet understand to be bad.

Re:No thanks

[HaZardman27]

A kid who learns JavaScript will very much be able to learn compiled languages later on in life if he/she so chooses. You don't have to have been born in the 1960s to become a competent programmer.

New Version of JavaScript Needed!

[Jaxim]

I feel sorry for the Minecraft developers. Have fun with a language that doesn't have a class object system like every other modern mature computer language which makes working in a team environment so much easier.

While we're at it, why don't we introduce PERL to minecraft?

HTML was upgraded to HTML5 and CSS was upgraded to CSS3. Why can't JavaScript be upgraded so it is more in line with modern languages? If that could happen then Google could give up on developing their new DART language which is designed to replace JavaScript.

Re:New Version of JavaScript Needed!

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously!

Exposing types within the language (including function types), forcing type-correct compilation, and coming up with some kind of bytecode (or similar) intermediary language would go a huge distance to making large software implementable in JS.

Unfortunately, I doubt we will ever see it and DART is probably the most likely solution (and it seems to more-or-less accomplish these goals).

Re:New Version of JavaScript Needed!

[aztracker1]

See TypeScript, CoffeeScript and other trans-compiled to JS options...

Re:New Version of JavaScript Needed!

[Pherdnut]

The key word is ECMAScript. It has versions. It is in fact evolving quite rapidly. Also, classes seem kinda silly once you actually properly understand the power-blend of functional and uniquely function-oriented JS OOP and the fact that it basically makes everything class-based languages do possible and more. I'd recommend learning JavaScript properly. You might actually discover that you never understood OOP if you're one of those who doesn't understand how getters/setters all over the place basically murder the whole concept of OOP.

Lua support...

[Isaac Remuant]

I don't think there's much hope of that considering the huge similarities with python and considerable disparity in library availability and popularity. I'm not sure there's much awareness of it outside the gaming development community.

This is old hat

[brendan.robert]

I don't see how someone reinventing the wheel should get /. coverage. WorldEdit, a very popular plugin, already has javascript integration. Also, check out GroovyBukkit for groovy integration that is incredibly easy to use. I did one-liners in Groovy to, say, lay rail tracks wherever you're standing if you are holding a rail in your hands -- that way you just walk and the tracks follow you. I have a 100-line bot named "David" (named after the Prometheus character) which helps non-op people obtain things without having to bug me all the time -- it's basically a switch statement and a lot of regex. Anyway, back to the point: It is extremely trivial to write a minecraft mod if you know how to code already. Writing a mod that is actually useful and doesn't crash the server -- that's another story. My only advice is to learn how to manage threads (so that uncaught exceptions don't crash the main server thread) and write watchdogs into your code to avoid infinite loops. :-D -B

Re:This is old hat

[erich666]

I agree, this isn't news. But I do think it's worth publicizing - I just found out myself a few months ago that WorldEdit has this functionality. WorldEdit's done this for years, e.g. check this project out: http://forum.sk89q.com/threads/fab-a-city-fabulous.556/ - all a JavaScript program.

It does make me smile that this new mod is called "ScriptCraft", as opposed to WorldEdit's old "CraftScript" system: "Now with two words swapped!"

Re:Java IS NOT JavaScript, you morons!

[meerling]

Javascript was originally named livescript, but with the sudden and powerful popularity of java, they changed the name to apparently capitalize on the trend.

Please don't insult Python

[Anonymous Coward]

Python is a decent scripting language, please don't call it inferior to the abomination that is Javascript.

Re:Please don't insult Python

[cod3r_]

Sorry. I just love curly braces, semi colons, and liberal use of white space as i see fit =) But I realize now I made a big mistake. Python is way better than JS what was I even thinking.

Re:Please don't insult Python

[Anonymous Coward]

Python is a decent scripting language, please don't call it inferior to the abomination that is Javascript.

PHP is a decent scripting language, please don't call it inferior to the abomination that is Python.

Re:Please don't insult Python

[Anonymous Coward]

Python is a decent scripting language, please don't call it inferior to the abomination that is Javascript.

PHP is a decent scripting language, please don't call it inferior to the abomination that is Python.

PHP decent? to think people here bash Java for a sport.
Slashdot should be renamed to Trollcraft.

Please no!

[mog007]

provides a way to get kids who are already hooked on Minecraft to start learning JavaScript

Won't somebody PLEASE think of the children and stop this madness?!

Hardly revolutionary

[Mercano]

Not sure how this is a groundbreaking achievement. ComputerCraft already provides a LUA interpreter and turtles, and has a lot more documentation. There's also RedPower's Control module, that gives you an emulated 6502-based 8 bit computer. A FORTH boot disk can be crafted in-game, or you can edit your save files to bring in either an BASIC boot disk or your own assembler code. (Previous /.coverage of the 6502 emulator blocks)

Re:Hardly revolutionary

[Vintermann]

This isn't 1962! We don't write programming languages in all caps just because they're programming languages.

Re:Hardly revolutionary

[Anonymous Coward]

Hence Lua.

Re:Hardly revolutionary

[Des Herriott]

Right, and there are also multiple Bukkit plugins which allow scripting in various languages - JRuby & Jython, for example. And WorldEdit already allows a degree of Javascript. I'm sure this particular mod is cool, but it's absolutely nothing new. People have been extending Minecraft with scripting tools for well over a year now.

Slashdot... 2011's news in 2013!

Re:Hardly revolutionary

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't 1962! We don't write programming languages in all caps just because they're programming languages.

Acronyms. Still useful, still relevant. Still correct.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acronym

Re:Hardly revolutionary

[Vintermann]

Lua isn't an acronym, nor is Forth. Fortran and Lisp have officially decided to not be written in all caps any longer.

Even when they were written in all caps, it wasn't because they were acronyms (then Fortran would be ForTran and Lisp would be LisP, I guess). It was because the computers of their era didn't support mixed case well. That's the reason they, along with COBOL (note: no one has bothered renaming it Cobol) are case insensitive languages to this day.

I like me some Python

[allcoolnameswheretak]

I wish he had chosen Jython. But then again, if he implemented it "the right way" using the Java scripting engine, Jython should be pluggable in no time.

Re:I like me some Python

[Pherdnut]

The problem with Jython is the part where you have to admit you already made one big mistake.

oh boy

[Anonymous Coward]

Just one more thing in minecraft to keep kids addicted to the computer instead of going out and getting fresh air.

So incredibly sad

[Anonymous Coward]

that he picked javascript, the scum at the bottom of the barrel.

While he was scraping up that muck and ladling it out, couldn't he have taken a glance at some of the GOOD languages out there?

Or use the source

[Cammi]

Or .. you could be a programmer and use Minecraft's source code that Mojang distributes with every release.

It's cool!

[Seor Jojoba]

So many times some kid has come up to me and said they wanted to learn to make video games. The trouble is that there's this giant gulf between the multimillion dollar games they play, and what they can actually do with newbie knowledge. When I was a teenager, (80's) I could see a game I loved like say... Ultima or Zork... and understand the steps leading up to me making that game. A little harder to find that maker's connection with Halo, Bioshock, Borderlands, etc. So maybe Minecraft can be a good bridge between the effort of programming and the rewards that are possible. A kid or some coming-up coder might get their feet wet writing some scripting for a game they love. So I'm all for it. Sounds great.