Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Microsoft Open Sources Parts of Minecraft's Java Code (kotaku.com.au)

Posted by BeauHD on from the keep-it-coming dept.

Four years after Microsoft acquired Minecraft developer Mojang, the company has decided to open source some of Minecraft's Java code. According to Kotaku, Microsoft and Mojang released two parts of Minecraft's Java code in library form, so that "anyone can pick them up and use them in their own game," says Lead Engineer Nathan Adams. From the report: For now, there's just the two libraries: "Brigadier," a "command parser and dispatcher"; and "DataFixerUpper," designed for "incremental building, merging and optimization of data transformations ... [to convert] the game data for Minecraft: Java Edition between different versions of the game." While the news doesn't mean much for players, it will be a boon for interested programmers and developers, keen to see the guts of Minecraft. The plan is to open source more components in the future, though no time frame is specified. For now, if you want to check out Brigadier or DataFixerUpper, both can be found on Mojang's GitHub page.

79 comments

  1. I'd love to see by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'd love to see the whole thing released, then better graphics produced so it everyone uses that instead of the crappy MS version.

    1. Re:I'd love to see by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

      I'd love to see the whole thing released, then better graphics produced so it everyone uses that instead of the crappy MS version.

      You can already have better graphics. Even without modding you can change out the shaders, for example, and the textures.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    2. Re:I'd love to see by Lije+Baley · · Score: 1

      Yeah, I wish they'd sell it to EA and then they could sell me a new version every year or so with slightly better graphics and...hopefully...ROYALE.

      --
      Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K.
    3. Re:I'd love to see by ArchieBunker · · Score: 1

      It's not hard to imagine what the source is like. Take every way you know to make efficient code and do the opposite.

      --
      Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
    4. Re:I'd love to see by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You do realize it's not the 90s anymore right? Modern VMs and JIT compilers are pretty damn close to C++ at this point. Sure, they're still overly verbose and convoluted, but performance and efficiency are almost on par.

    5. Re:I'd love to see by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      He was talking about the source, dickwad.

    6. Re:I'd love to see by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Efficient code", can only be measured once the code is compiled.... dipshit.

    7. Re:I'd love to see by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They why code at all if the compiler does all the work? Just hit COMPILE until you get the program you want.

    8. Re: I'd love to see by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, sell it to the most hated company on the net, so they can screw-over the user base with bloodsucking micro transactions. Genius!

  2. Remember the promise to open the whole thing? by drinkypoo · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Once sales start dying and a minimum time has passed, I will release the game source code as some kind of open source.

    Get back to me when the full sources have been released.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    1. Re:Remember the promise to open the whole thing? by Anubis+IV · · Score: 4, Informative

      Have sales died? Last I heard, it was still going strong.

    2. Re:Remember the promise to open the whole thing? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Minecraft (the real version, not the shitty Windows 10 version) has been for all practical purposes open-source since the beginning. With every new version volunteers decompile and deobfuscate the source so modders can use it. IIRC Mojang devs even assist them and have signaled that they would take over the project themselves if the current people quit for whatever reason.

    3. Re:Remember the promise to open the whole thing? by JediJorgie · · Score: 1

      How about we get back to your snarky ass when "sales start dying"?

      They just announced that Minecraft now has 70M+ active players each week. If releasing the code was 100% based on Notch's statment, they would not even have released what they just did.

    4. Re:Remember the promise to open the whole thing? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Moron troll.

    5. Re:Remember the promise to open the whole thing? by Not-a-Neg · · Score: 1

      The "Super Duper 4K" upgrade that was announced nearly 2 years ago (okay, a year and a half) has been delayed repeatedly. Microsoft is attempting to keep people interested in the game while they continue to delay the only thing worth a damn that Minecraft fans are waiting for.

      --
      -==- Buy a Mac and leave me alone!
    6. Re:Remember the promise to open the whole thing? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      How about we get back to your snarky ass when "sales start dying"?

      Son, you have missed the whole point. And there was even already a response along the same lines, which was also rebuffed, which you also missed. Maybe this whole internets thing is not your bag.

      Notch gave up control to Microsoft instead of giving it up to the users. That means he can never fulfill his promise. That means it was bait and switch. HTH, HAND.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  3. More interestingly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Those are pretty irrelevant. What I want is better API for mod-writers.

    More interestingly: I heard news that there would be coming a version where you can add new mobs as JSON files.

    1. Re:More interestingly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Switch to Minetest. It's completely open and has a better mod API.

    2. Re: More interestingly by spongman · · Score: 1

      Does mine test have any content, though? Like the multitude of mod packs, total conversions, and countless ctm/adventure & creative/building maps available for Minecraft?

    3. Re: More interestingly by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Does mine test have any content, though? Like the multitude of mod packs, total conversions, and countless ctm/adventure & creative/building maps available for Minecraft?

      There is nowhere near as much for minetest as there is for MC, but there are mods for it which provide most of the functionality you would expect. The big problem is the lack of players.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    4. Re: More interestingly by VanessaE · · Score: 1

      *clears throat*

      There is a good selection of content - in the form of mods (at least a few hundred, but I can't give you an exact count), mod packs, texture packs, and what we call "sub-games", which can be anything from minor changes to a complete overhaul of the game play.

      All mods/modpacks are open source, written in Lua. The engine supports acceleration via LuaJIT, and the modding API can be enhanced/expanded with libraries such as luasocket (for example, IRC for command and control, or to link several servers' chats together via a common #channel). Most mods are true FOSS, but the exact licenses naturally vary by author.

      Mods run on the server (or server-process); a basic client modding API is present as well, which individual players may take advantage of if they want. Such mods are installed by the player, and only alter their client's behavior - what one player has installed has no appreciable effect on anyone else or on the server (or that's the intent of client-supplied mods anyway). Server-supplied client mods are on the engine road map. Unlike MC, players do not have to mod their clients to match a server's mods, and they are free to install any mods they want for their own, single-player use, regardless of what their favorite servers have.

      If you can think of it, there's a good chance a mod exists to supply it, except that our mods can't change the engine or shaders (there's generally no need to do so in the former case, and the latter is currently a controversial topic).

      There's a good selection of public game servers as well. Couple hundred at the moment on the public list (the number varies), plus however many private/unlisted ones there are.

      Servers (or single-player mode) can operate in creative or survival mode, and the latter can be anywhere from easy to hardcore. Hybrid operation is possible too (i.e. some level of survival, with creative rights given to selected individuals, as the admin sees fit).

      The standard Minetest package comes with a command-line server application, plus the client can be used to host a server from one of the user's local worlds (using whatever mods that world is configured to use).

      The client features an in-game mini-map, and external utilities exist to generate large overviews, even interactive pan/zoom maps, such as this one on my website.

      Both the engine core and the default game content (which is itself a sub-game) are under active development, though the developers would surely appreciate more contributions.

      Get it from the official website or get the engine source from the official Github repository. The default sub-game comes with the package on the Minetest website, or get it from its official Github repository. Note: on both repos, the "master" branch is "unstable" development leading up to 5.0.0. Visitors will probably want the "stable-0.4" branch. Oh, and no, that's not a typo - the version scheme changed after the 0.4 series, to drop that leading zero.

      Android and iOS clients exist, too, but I make no recommendations one way or another on those.

      We also have an active discussion forum, which also serves as a prominent place to release new content. There's also the official Minetest content database, another place new content can be released.

      Full disclosure: I'm a prominent member of the Minetest community: modder, texture pack author, and server operator (two easy survival, two creative, one nostalgic, plus a couple that I host for friends). So I'm a little biased. :-)

      Note: if someone tells you to use some links other than what I gave above, disregard that person's links and claims.

    5. Re: More interestingly by VanessaE · · Score: 1

      Minor edit: l now they're called just "games" instead of "sub games". Meh, guess I forgot :-P

    6. Re: More interestingly by VanessaE · · Score: 1

      s/I now/I guess now/

    7. Re: More interestingly by VanessaE · · Score: 1

      oh, and it's http://forum.minetest.net./ Slashdot ate my link

  4. what do they hope to gain by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Nobody in development will contribute to it.

  5. Piece-meal, spoon fed open source? Is this a joke? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Piece-meal, spoon fed open source? Is this a joke?

  6. Recently started modded play with Stoneblock by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 2

    Minecraft sees so primitive and shallow compared to modded Minecraft.

    They should really back up a truck full of money to the mod community and get some of that code added to the main code base.

    The glacial pace of current development is stunting the game.

    There is a rich deep world of play out there in the modded community.

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
    1. Re: Recently started modded play with Stoneblock by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It depends on whether you play the game or fiddle with the code. It's all a sandbox. Like with LEGO you can buy the latest shiny packs, or build stuff with basic blocks.

    2. Re:Recently started modded play with Stoneblock by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      no.

    3. Re:Recently started modded play with Stoneblock by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ummmmm..Thats the point of mods - Mojang keeps their original artistic control - but allows the game to be extensively modded for extra freedom outside that sphere. they have taken ideas before - such as the horse. have you really tried vanilla minecraft pushed to its limits in a real multiplayer server? nothing tops

    4. Re:Recently started modded play with Stoneblock by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 1

      Yup.

      And it's just so boring.

      You can beat the game in a week tops.

      Minecraft says, "40 new slabs, walls and stairs!" Meanwhile, I just found in modded minecraft there are *hundreds* of new slabs, walls and stairs. Heck, cobble stone alone has about 30 different textures you can chisel it too.

      And there's an upgrade path which takes more than a few days to max out.

      And lots of new tools/tinker toys to puzzle over.

      I've played the game for 7 years. I think it's just too simplistic and the pace of development is too slow. By 2 years in, I was chafing at the constraints. In my own game/servers I was doing custom command blocks to implement longer leveling/upgrade paths and new functionality.

      Minecraft could and should have the functionality of tinker's construct by now. It's a billion dollar product. The team is too small.

      I honestly don't see how I could go back to vanilla minecraft at this point.

      --
      She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
  7. It's java...why not decompile? by twdorris · · Score: 1

    Isn't Java practically open source by design? What has kept the unwashed masses from decompiling already?

    1. Re:It's java...why not decompile? by cre1mer · · Score: 0

      Decompiling Java is an advanced topic for most script kiddies.

      --
      Goodbye, Slashdot!
    2. Re:It's java...why not decompile? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They have and that is how many mods started. But the problem is keeping up with it.

    3. Re:It's java...why not decompile? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's exactly what Forge is - a mod framework based on decompiling the whole game.

    4. Re:It's java...why not decompile? by jeremyp · · Score: 2

      Last time I tried to decompile it, it turned out the code was obfuscated. You can decompile it, but that's the easy part.

      --
      All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
    5. Re:It's java...why not decompile? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Obfuscation is why - you can decompile it, but you end up with classes with names like "akw", "bzi", "cwf", and "dhp", all containing function/variable names with random Unicode characters as names.

    6. Re: It's java...why not decompile? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If there was ever a need for a "-1 stupid motherfucker" moderation option, you are the prime candidate.

    7. Re: It's java...why not decompile? by spongman · · Score: 1

      Decomposing Java is as easy as downloading Mcp and running a batch script. Trivial.

    8. Re: It's java...why not decompile? by spongman · · Score: 1

      Download mcp.

    9. Re:It's java...why not decompile? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Today I learned that Tata & WipeNo run all their code through a decompiler.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    10. Re:It's java...why not decompile? by johnsie · · Score: 1

      Why bother? Just make a clone with the same functionality and then you wont have to be stuck maintaining someone else's crappy code.

  8. Re: Piece-meal, spoon fed open source? Is this a j by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's the pieces that help move from the Java version towards the other versions.
    If you can't see Microsoft's endgame here then you need your eyes checked.

  9. Is it the Infiniminer part? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It really should be the Infiniminer part, given that it was stolen and all and selling it as your own is against the law. Law that Microsoft lobbied hard for... after Bill Gates got pissed off with everyone copying software... after Bill Gates stole CP/M and used it in DOS.

    1. Re:Is it the Infiniminer part? by Megane · · Score: 1

      False. The first demo video of Minecraft was posted May 13, 2009. Infiminer source was released May 16, 2009. Obviously Notch had been working on his code for at least a few weeks before then. As you can probably tell, 16 is greater than 13.

      Unfortunately that video, "Cave game tech test" by Nizzoch (F9t3FREAZ-k) is "not available in your country". This and this seem to be re-posted copies of it. I can't watch the original via Hooktube, but at least the date and description shows:

      Cave game tech test
      Published by Nizzotch on Wed, 13 May 2009 17:47:26 GMT

      This is a very early test of an Infiniminer clone I'm working on. It will have more resource management and materials, if I ever get around to finishing it.

      It currently runs at about 700 fps for a 256x256x64 tile map.

      You can follow development on my blog: http://notch.tumblr.com/

      --
      #naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
  10. Terasology, Minetest, etc. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Terasology is a much more visually appealing Minecraft, written in java, and Minetest is opensource, fast, ran on as little as a P3 with 512 megs of ram and a 128 meg Radeon 9600 @ 15-30 fps depending on view distance.

    There are much better 'Minecraft' games out there, already open source, with plenty of mods available, multiplayer, and using far lower specs for far higher performance than Minecraft ever did.

    Look into them, enjoy, ignore anything Microsoft produces you don't have to use at gunpoint.

    1. Re:Terasology, Minetest, etc. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I've played with Minetest, I wish it had the mind share that Minecraft has because I really think it could be a much better game in the long run. It is designed to be modded, in fact the main game is actually a mod. If it had a very simplified installation process with a launcher that could pull in mods (something like the Curse/Twitch launcher for Minecraft) and actively publicized itself to get mod developers on board it could be a wonderful platform.

  11. Poor craftsmanship by skoskav · · Score: 3, Informative

    These code bases have a serious issue with readability and maintainability. They seem to frequently write massive methods with deep nesting, and not even leaving some API or class documentation for posterity.

    It's the kind of gobbledygook code that I only see from freshly-graduated programmers and in competitive coding puzzles. Mojang should spend a few days to set up some static code analyzing tool like SonarQube.

    1. Re:Poor craftsmanship by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not disagreeing with any of your points except the last one: Mojang should do what Mojang wants and not capitulate to other peoples' opinions. He and Microsoft release some code and the response reads to me like:

      "What is this shit? I wanted all the code! And this code...I can't read it. Makes no sense! Go back and do it all over again, and write some documentation. Then get back to me. Also I'm not going to lift a finger for you."

      Reminds me of when one of my games sunset and I asked people in a developer forum what I should do with it. The almost unanimous answer was "You should open source it so other people can use it" with several replies all but hinting it was my civic responsibility.

    2. Re:Poor craftsmanship by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's not nearly as bad as the some of the Java I've seen at work. Although our developers are getting better.

    3. Re:Poor craftsmanship by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's the kind of gobbledygook code that I only see from freshly-graduated programmers and in competitive coding puzzles.

      Hey now, we call that Enterprise grade Java!

    4. Re:Poor craftsmanship by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      These code bases have a serious issue with readability and maintainability. They seem to frequently write massive methods with deep nesting, and not even leaving some API or class documentation for posterity.

      Notch wasn't much of a programmer, he was better at design. He left but the legacy of crap code persists. That's why there are several clones which are technically superior to minecraft. Unfortunately, almost nobody plays them, so if you want to play with large numbers of strangers you play minecraft anyway.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    5. Re:Poor craftsmanship by DRJlaw · · Score: 1

      Mojang should spend a few days to set up some static code analyzing tool like SonarQube.

      Mojang should spend $150K/year to have you do it. Then remind you that after working on it for years you'll have made a few hundredths of a percent of what they did from "gobbledygook."

    6. Re:Poor craftsmanship by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      76 lines is a 'massive' method?

      I thought that was the bare minimum for a Java 'hello world'.

      Jokes aside, 'massive' in my books is 300-500 lines. Your 76 lines is more like 'somewhat unwieldy'.

    7. Re:Poor craftsmanship by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To be fair, two of those links go to DataFixerUpper, where the code author actually impelmented Profunctor Optics in fucking Java. That's category theory type stuff that's usually found in pure FP languages like Haskell; props to the guy that did that, because manually implementing that in Java is both twisted and very impressive.

      (From what I read elsewhere, it was the work of the Forge dev that Mojang hired, rather than the original crew.)

    8. Re:Poor craftsmanship by skoskav · · Score: 1

      That seems pretty cool. Thanks for the link. Unfortunately it's annoyingly difficult to figure out how to use it in that repository -- or even if it works -- as there are neither documentation nor unit tests.

    9. Re:Poor craftsmanship by skoskav · · Score: 1

      I suppose that was a bit of hyperbole. However, the actual issue with that method in particular is that it performs several tasks that can be placed into named concepts -- i.e. methods:
      * Fetch nodes to loop through
      * Parse a node
      * Determine if a node meets some criteria
      * Recursively parse sub-nodes
      * Sort the resulting nodes

      The recursive call complicates refactoring though, but the simple act of learning the "Extract to method" shortcut in their IDE could do tremendous good for readability here.

    10. Re:Poor craftsmanship by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I completely agree, the lack of documentation on something that...obtuse (to be generous) is a travesty. Not gonna lie, I barely understand what's going on in the "here, this is profunctor optics in a nutshell" posts I've read, and those don't have fifty pounds of Java boilerplate piled on top to make things even more incomprehensible.

      I'm into functional programming and greatly prefer it to OOP, so when I stumbled onto this discussion about the code, my reaction started with "that sounds familiar, FP thing isn't it?", followed by "oh shit, that's some next-level stuff," then "maybe they started using Scala which has libs for that kind of thing," finally ending at "holy fuck the madman implemented this in pure Java. I can't even read this shit." It's impressive but Java is such a terrible language for doing FP, and I can't help but think maybe they should have just used a different JVM language for that. Scala, or maybe Eta if you're that determined to write Haskell in places it doesn't belong. lol.

      (Finally, thanks for the response. I'm used to getting ignored here when I post AC, so it's nice to see some people still read and respond to ACs here. Forgot my login info years ago but can't be arsed to make a new one because I don't comment often.)

    11. Re:Poor craftsmanship by skoskav · · Score: 1

      I'm not sure if you're aware of what static code analysis is, but it does not necessitate a re-write. Refactoring is something every developer should do, treating it like the Boy Scout Rule. It's as much about cleaning up existing code as it is about not adding new litter.

    12. Re:Poor craftsmanship by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Brigadier" - just use yacc and bison
      "DataFixerUpper" - just use SOAP, or ActiveMQ, or Redis, or Google's Protocol Buffers, or CORBA, or ...

    13. Re:Poor craftsmanship by DRJlaw · · Score: 1

      I'm not sure if you're aware of what static code analysis is, but it does not necessitate a re-write. Refactoring is something every developer should do, treating it like the Boy Scout Rule [deviq.com]. It's as much about cleaning up existing code as it is about not adding new litter.

      I'm not sure if you understand that "not... a re-write" is quite inconsistent with "refactoring" and even "cleaning up existing code." You've run the gamut from nothing to ground-up reconstruction in the space of two sentences.

      Craftsmanship is only a principal goal for hobbiests. There are many other concerns and goals in most projects, and craftsmanship can validly be subordinated to them. Especially when you're writing a game and not a general purpose library.

    14. Re:Poor craftsmanship by skoskav · · Score: 1

      I'm not sure if you understand that "not... a re-write" is quite inconsistent with "refactoring" and even "cleaning up existing code." You've run the gamut from nothing to ground-up reconstruction in the space of two sentences.

      It seems to me that you are arguing against a position I am not taking, and perhaps vice-versa. Your first post seemed to me to speak of spending years re-implementing their code base, and I disagreed with that approach, instead trying to clarify that the existing code can be progressively cleaned up with the guiding help of a static analyzer.

      Craftsmanship is only a principal goal for hobbiests. There are many other concerns and goals in most projects, and craftsmanship can validly be subordinated to them. Especially when you're writing a game and not a general purpose library.

      I would instead suggest that craftsmanship should be a discipline for engineers. Hobbyists in my experience tend to forgo tests, documentation and maintainability. A game like Minecraft is a long-term money-making project that needs to be maintained for at least a decade. Working with low test coverage and poorly-written code will inevitably lead to bugs and slow feature progression.

    15. Re:Poor craftsmanship by DRJlaw · · Score: 1

      Your first post seemed to me to speak of spending years re-implementing their code base, and I disagreed with that approach...

      No, it was another way of expressing this, to someone who does not appear to have any comparable experience leading project with a wide audience, much less one that is commercially successful.

      ...instead trying to clarify that the existing code can be progressively cleaned up with the guiding help of a static analyzer.

      Oh... so the "It's the kind of gobbledygook code that I only see from freshly-graduated programmers and in competitive coding puzzles" quip was merely a gratuitous insult.

      Working with low test coverage and poorly-written code will inevitably lead to bugs and slow feature progression.

      You have no idea what the test coverage is. Your unidimensional vision of "craftsmanship" does not compel the conclusion that their code is "poorly written."

      Their code is fit for purpose. They've succeeded wildly beyond your measure. Effortlessly criticizing their gift makes you look arrogant, envious, and cheap.

      It's open source now. Fix it yourself.

    16. Re:Poor craftsmanship by skoskav · · Score: 1

      No, it was another way of expressing this, to someone who does not appear to have any comparable experience leading project with a wide audience, much less one that is commercially successful.

      That AC is right in a way; Mojang should do what Mojang wants. But I still think you're gravely overestimating the cost in time and money of setting up e.g. SonarQube into the build pipeline. Granted, I haven't worked on games that sell 150+ million copies, but my experience as a senior developer in various projects and teams -- from security programs installed by ~10 million end-users, to games that at their height were played by ~500,000 yearly -- has taught me some lessons, ones that largely echoes one of my favorite authors on programming, Robert C. Martin, who in the introductory chapter of Clean Code writes:

      Over the span of a year or two, teams that were moving very fast at the beginning of a project can find themselves moving at a snail’s pace. Every change they make to the code breaks two or three other parts of the code. No change is trivial. Every addition or modification to the system requires that the tangles, twists, and knots be “understood” so that more tangles, twists, and knots can be added. Over time the mess becomes so big and so deep and so tall, they can not clean it up. There is no way at all.

      As the mess builds, the productivity of the team continues to decrease, asymptotically approaching zero. As productivity decreases, management does the only thing they can; they add more staff to the project in hopes of increasing productivity. But that new staff is not versed in the design of the system. They don’t know the difference between a change that matches the design intent and a change that thwarts the design intent. Furthermore, they, and everyone else on the team, are under horrific pressure to increase productivity. So they all make more and more messes, driving the productivity ever further toward zero.

      The only ways I've experienced successful long-term projects with happy developers is to introduce an objective code quality measure into the build pipeline, limiting bad code buildup. Checks that e.g. put a limit on nesting and cyclomatic complexity, and demand a certain level of code coverage by tests are relatively easy to follow, and do a tremendous good.

      Oh... so the "It's the kind of gobbledygook code that I only see from freshly-graduated programmers and in competitive coding puzzles" quip was merely a gratuitous insult.

      Nope, that was comparing what I saw in the examples I posted to what I've experienced in the past. The clarification I mentioned later was directed at you. But if my comment was seen as an insult then I feel bad, as it was intended as snark.

      You have no idea what the test coverage is. Your unidimensional vision of "craftsmanship" does not compel the conclusion that their code is "poorly written."

      I have some idea. DataFixedUpper and LegacyWrapper have zero percent coverage, and brigadier has an unknown amount of coverage because they don't measure it.

      Their code is fit for purpose. They've succeeded wildly beyond your measure. Effortlessly criticizing their gift makes you look arrogant, envious, and cheap.

      It's open source now. Fix it yourself.

      My effortless criticism for why I thought their code seemed to lack in quality even came bundled with a tip on how to remedy it. The tip was perhaps moreso a cautionary tale for fellow Slashdotters to use static code analysis, as I wasn't expecting Mojang to be reading this story submission anyway. Again, if my snark was seen as a gratuitous insult then I will try to make myself clearer in the future.

    17. Re:Poor craftsmanship by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, because their paying users really care about the number of lines in their methods, don't they?

    18. Re:Poor craftsmanship by sproketboy · · Score: 1

      Wahhh. Cry to mommy.

  12. Just in time by Trogre · · Score: 1

    Just in time for Oracle to screw it all up and start charging for Java licences.

    --
    "Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
  13. Lego isn't an acronym, you fucktard. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    LIAAYF

  14. Oh my God! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Seriously? That is SO incredible! I can't believe it! The company has changed so much. This is earth shattering. Microsoft is clearly now only about open source. Heck, they've transformed so much, they now ARE open source. What an amazing development. I am dumbfounded. Bumfuzzled. This is so-o-o-o incredible!

    (Sorry. Lost my /sarcasm tag).

  15. Re:You are intentionally missing the point. by DRJlaw · · Score: 1

    You are intentionally avoiding the point.

    If sales have not died down, then the condition has not been met.

  16. Re:You are intentionally missing the point. by Anubis+IV · · Score: 1

    I’m all for holding people accountable, but it sounds like you’re suggesting “the point” is that we should be upset at someone for NOT breaking their word. I cordially disagree and would like to suggest that you are intentionally being obtuse if you would suggest otherwise.

  17. Is minecraft still a thing? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And Java... ugh!

  18. Re: Piece-meal, spoon fed open source? Is this a j by Megane · · Score: 1

    Microsoft's endgame

    Porting it to C#/.NET?

    --
    #naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
  19. Open source by TJHook3r · · Score: 1

    Would have been even better to open source the whole thing! The Pi edition is obviously welcome but is so old as to be off-putting for young coders. It would be like offering a free version of FIFA soccer that only has goalkeepers.

  20. Re: Piece-meal, spoon fed open source? Is this a j by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

    Porting it to C#/.NET?

    I'm about 95% sure that they will do a complete rewrite in C#/.NET and offer it only for Windows and Xbox, eventually. And then do everything they can to absolutely kill the Java version, as it will represent competition.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  21. How the hell is that complex code to you? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's just a very verbose language, a very verbose style, and a very verbose library API.

    The functions you linked to can be be fully understood with a few quick glances, and are almost trivial. Are you seriously that easily overwhelmed?

    Get back to me when you have been coding for 40 years, and your code resembles something from the latest CS / category theory papers, giving you more in one line, than an entire of the linked functions. E.g. fun stuff, like this: https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/latest/docs/html/users_guide/lang.html

    Maybe you should stay with your <100 lines Python scripts.

    1. Re:How the hell is that complex code to you? by skoskav · · Score: 1

      I don't yet meet your arbitrary criteria, but one of my favorite programming authors that I just cited on the subject of maintainable code has been programming since 1969, and dedicates chapters to explaining and demonstrating why code such as that which I linked to is a bad idea, and how easy it is to write much better code.

      Get back to me when you have been coding for 50 years, and written Minecraft in Haskell. =)