From b1ebd14abdfbf6a3c5f2c303da92c19bbd7d9d27 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Raine <raine@ixvd.net>
Date: Thu, 26 Oct 2023 01:55:54 +0200
Subject: [PATCH] doc: proposal on on-demand mc servers

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