Minecraft Terrain

This is a Sunday test to create some real terrain into the great game Minecraft. The idea was to use DEM files (Digital Elevation Model) to get the real elevations of a known place. DEM files can be found around internet. The next step was to be able to send the information to Minecraft. To solve this, I choose to install the Canarymod Minecraft Server with a plugin that allows to send commands via python.

Setup

These are the main steps:

1. Python virtual environment
2. Canarymod
3. Raspberry Juice Plugin
4. DEM files
5. Run script
6. Play

Step 1. Create the Python virtual environment and install needed packages

mkvirtualenv minecraft_terrain
pip install -r requirements.txt

Step 2. Download and install Canarymod Minecraft Server

• Create a folder for Canarymod.
• Download https://canarymod.net/releases/CanaryMod-1.2.0_0.zip
• Unzip it
• Edit the file eula.txt and set eula=true
• Run java -jar CanaryMod-1.8.0-1.2.0.jar

Step 3. Download and Install Raspberry Juice Plugin

This is necessary to run your Minecraft with an API.

• Download the source code from https://github.com/martinohanlon/CanaryRaspberryJuice/archive/master.zip
• Open the zip file and copy the latest version of the plugin CanaryRaspberryJuice-#.#.jar from the jars folder to the plugins folder in the Canarymod folder.

Step4. Download DEM files

For example, in Barcelona Area, the ICGC has 5x5 Elevation Models http://www.icgc.cat/appdownloads/

• build a VRT from all downloaded datasets

gdalbuildvrt -te 395000 4603000 405500 4607180 montserrat.vrt dems/*.txt

Step 5. Run everything together

• Start up Canarymod (with the Raspberry Juice Plugin)
• Run the terrain.py script to read the DEM file and create the terrain
• Start minecraft
• Fly and enjoy the tour (/gamemode 1 )

Step6. Run Minecraft and fly