2023-10-26 01:55:54 +02:00
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# Dynamic Minecraft Servers
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> **Status:** Proposed
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> **Submitted:** Oct 26th, 2023
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## The idea
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Provision minecraft servers on-demand.
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Servers are expensive especially when you don't have a sustained amount of active players.
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Therefore it's probably a good idea to dynamically start and provision servers that can handle minecraft servers and kill them when demand ends.
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## Flow
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Terms:
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- `Client`: End User
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- `Server`: The provisioner
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- `Instance`: Provisioned servers
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### Connecting
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The flow of connecting will look something like this.
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1. Client connects to custom^[1]^ minecraft proxy.
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2. Server checks if minecraft server exists and runs
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1. Minecraft server is live: Server connects client to minecraft server.
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2. Minecraft server is being created: Server waits until process finished and connects client to minecraft server.
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3. Minecraft server doesn't exist
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1. Server creates new cloud instance according to config.
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2. Server waits 'till ICMP succeeds.
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3. Server ssh'es into server and starts instance according to config.
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4. Server waits 'till minecraft server starts.
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5. Server connects client to minecraft server.
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3. Server closes connection.
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### Demand end
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When demand ends the flow will look something like this.
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0. Instance sends `DEMAND_END` to server
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1. Server marks instance as `stopping` and won't connect clients to it.
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2. The instance is stopped. (send `MC_STOPPED` to server)
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3. Data is .tar.gz'd and sent to a storage medium. (sftp/cifs/...???)
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4. Instance does post-flight checks.
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1. Is all data backed up?
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5. Instance sends `EXITING`
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6. Server removes reference to instance.
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7. Server destroys instance from hosting.
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## Storage
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All data whould be from the IDLE state of a server.
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When demand ends all data should be sent to a storage medium; compressed.
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When demand starts all data should be pulled from a storage medium and decompressed.
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## Why is this significant?
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Minecraft is a fun game, however it's trending in waves, therfore there are a lot of bursts of activity but not sustained.
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Maintaining the Minecraft infrastructure can be done but it's tiresome and, maybe more importantly, dependant on humans.
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People living in the US might connect when the admin is sleeping. Thus they can't play.
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A simple proxy/manager can solve this.
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## Cost
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'Tis a dynamic scaling solution, thus undeterminable.
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However, should this proposal be accepted the manager should have a option to refuse creation upon reached budget.
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## Existing tooling
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- [TimoCloud] might be a good example of what we're trying to do.
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- [OnDemandMinecraft] does this idea with AWS but with a web-ui to start the server.
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- [MineCloud] does this idea also with AWS but [MineCloud] uses a discord bot to start the server.
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## Notes
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2023-10-26 01:58:00 +02:00
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- [1]: Yet to be written/determined which.
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2023-10-26 01:55:54 +02:00
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<!-- Links -->
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[TimoCloud]: https://github.com/TimoCloud/TimoCloud
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[OnDemandMinecraft]: https://github.com/trevor-laher/OnDemandMinecraft
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[MineCloud]: https://github.com/VeriorPies/MineCloud
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