Information: 1MoreBlock and Minecraft 1.16.x

[Floris]

Dear excited players,

Not long after the release of 1.15 and us upgrading to it, we've by now enjoyed it for about six plus months. Not long after the release, Mojang let us know there's a Nether Update coming, (and a combat update is being worked on, and a Mountain update was voted on by the community, etc., and we're still all begging for a cave update right?)

Minecraft version 1.16.x is the Nether Update.

We here at 1MoreBlock.com have been doing private and public live-streams of playing creative, survival, hardcore, events, and exploring-features, bug-hunting, etc.

Testing and testing

Internally we've been testing the snapshot and pre-releases through Mojang's provided server.jar file. And so far as performance wise what we can expect should be on-par with 1.15.2.

Heads-up!

This forum thread is to give everybody a heads-up that Mojang is working on 1.16, that we're looking into our options to upgrade 1MoreBlock.com (and network) from 1.15.2 to 1.16.x at some point this year. And that if you have resources in any temporary worlds that you should remove them in time.

Temporary Worlds

1MB has a couple of temporary worlds, these are our resource worlds. For example: /nether, /end, and /mine.

If you have a temporary base here, or grinders with chests, etc. please collect your items to avoid loss.

Not too long ago we've announced this on Discord, today on the forums, and soon we will have do so in-game as well. Making sure nobody can miss this heads-up. Because lost items will not get restored.

Permanent Worlds

1MB has a few permanent worlds, these are our build and survival worlds. For example: /spawn, /general, /legacy, /wild, etc.

If you have a base here, grinders, or various homes. Do not worry, we will keep these worlds (we never reset perm-worlds).

We will convert and upgrade existing worlds to 1.16.x.

Upgrading software.

We are using the switch to 1.16 as an opportunity to upgrade our internal tools from 1MB 2.7.3 to 1MB 2.8.x, this will take a bit of time. We might also consider converting our Minecraft engine, this will also take a bit of time.

To clarify, we are depending on Mojang to release 1.16 as a stable and working version that we can upgrade from, and then depend on (Craft)Bukkit/Spigot to release a (stable) and working version that we can test our worlds on, and our plugins. We then depend on the authors of these plugins to update their resources to support 1.16 properly. This requires time to wait for, to test with, to wait for bug fixes, etc.

How long it takes to update our software depends on a handful of things, and can take from days to months. Please have as much patience as we're trying to have.

What we have done so far

We have been keeping an eye on the specifics of the snapshots and pre-releases, we have been trying to speak to developers, server owners, and Mojang staff to learn (and raise concerns). We have also been internally testing individual step-upgrades (one world, multiple worlds, one feature, multiple features, one world with one feature, multiple.. etc)

We've increased our system memory and storage features to prepare for the increase in traffic, storage, and performance required (sigh, this wasn't cheap, thank you for your donations btw, if you want to help). We now have 64gb RAM available (yay ram-disk) and an array of nvme/sata3 SSD disks for storage and backups. We have been preparing developer setups, testing environments, and discussing specifics of our rules and policies for the rest of the year. Any bugs we've found we've reported to Mojira.

Huge but here!

<insert huge but here> BUT, we do what we can do. And we care about you as a player. We won't RESET any perm-worlds, and we are not interested in you losing your items and builds, or your inventories. And this means we are going to spend a lot of our free time trying and testing and running 1.16 upgrades, converts, patches, and all sorts of stuff to try and make that happen.

And if 1.16 has corruption issues, chunks disappearing, items disappearing from armor stands and item frames, and weird stuff like that: We will just wait for 1.16.1, or 1.16.2, or 1.17.x.. before trying again.

It's also possible that due to disappearing developers some features we currently enjoy do not get an upgrade (just yet) and we go live without it.

Rules

We will also take this opportunity to adjust our Forum/Discord/Minecraft rules again. We will review them individually and try to make things a bit more clear. We want to make a safe and friendly space for people to enjoy their time with others, building things while surviving, etc.

So what's next?

Test internally, prepare for an upgrade, and hope for the best.

When we have a stable core engine, with stable core plugins, and we have converted from 1.15.2 to 1.16.1 (or .2) and are confident after some internal beta testing we can publicly test it. Then we will run it live for about a week. This is our 'buffer or grace' period. If nobody comes and reports issues with their build areas and stuff, then we will keep what we have and more forward. If there's a reason to rollback, we will do so as soon as possible. If players come online and test everything and find issues, we roll back to 1.15.2 and try fixing the issues reported and create a new buffer-period upgrade.

SO MUCH TEXT: I AM LAZY

I am sorry you're lazy, we're a community, I put multiple hours per day into this community to make it fun for you all. I think reading for 5 minutes in return to let you enjoy 1.16 as soon as we can is the least I can ask. Oh, and to come online to help test. And this way you get answers to all the questions I get. Thank you for understanding and your time as well. wubya

Summery:

Mojang has to release Vanilla 1.16 for Java: DONE!? (They already released an update as well 1.16.1)
SpigotMC has to release Spigot 1.16.1 for Java: md_5 has it internally, we're waiting for a download to become available.
Spigot Plugin Authors have to upgrade their plugins to the new API so it works with Spigot 1.16 releases.
When the above conditions are done, and we're done testing: We will do a public test that you can join.

Again, if it all fails, and the CPU runs at 100% all the time, and nobody can play because the TPS is dropping to 15 or lower every hour etc .. We're canning the idea of upgrading and will stick to 1.15.2

As with every grace period between versions, as soon as ViaVersion supports 1.15.2 and 1.16 clients to connect to 1.16 servers, we will install it and help everybody play a little easier. We strongly suggestion to use 1.16 client to connect to 1.16 server. And 1.15.2 client to connect to 1.15.2 server.

Final words

If you have any questions, any concerns, this is the time to ask them. Post them to this thread please and I will do my best to answer/explain.

Thank you for playing on 1MoreBlock.com, some of your already for nearly a decade!

 

[Floris]

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Question: Will I lose all my inventories, homes, chests, etc?
Answer: Nope. We will only convert over if we keep our worlds, inventories, homes, etc.

Question: What does this grace period mean?
Answer: The grace period I've mentioned is a week (or maybe two) where we play on the new version publicly. If during this period everything seems fine and we have no reason to roll-back, we will move forward with what we have. If however we do find big enough issues to stop, we will. And then roll back to the previously working 1.15.2's latest backup. Use the grace period not to start building big new things, but use it to test if your items are there, still work, if your builds are there, and intact, and if everything you do daily is still working as you expect it.

Question: What if I cannot be online during the grace period, and everything goes wrong after?
Answer: If someone is unable to come online and finds out later that something is terribly broken, we will review the situation and make the best of it. Please try to find time the week we've converted. Just to make sure you're not putting yourself in that situation.

Question: Feature X worked in 1.15.2, but doesn't in 1.16 !!
Answer: Report it. Maybe there is a missing permission, or the plugin needs a hot-fix, or maybe you found a bug. It's also possible that the developer has informed us they're not moving forward with that feature and we can't use it anymore. This does sometimes happen.

Question: Can I donate to help you convert faster?
Answer: It's not about time, it's about being able to do it. And yes, then to do that within the free time we have. Donating doesn't speed up this process, but it sure is a motivator. PayPal.me/mrfloris is open to donations.

Question: Is there a private test server where I can help?
Answer: Yes, there is, we have a three stage process. A owner/admin development server that nobody gets access to. A private test server where we invite team members, helpers, and developers to test features and world converts. And the public server where you can join and test things out. If we need help on the test server we reach out to active online players, this could be you indeed.

Question: When will the server run on 1.16?
Answer: First, Mojang had to release 1.16 as a server package on the 23rd (They've done this now). It looks like they're on schedule and already have a maintenance release out: 1.16.1. Secondly, Spigot has to update their software for 1.16.1 or newer. md_5 is already hard at work doing this as bug free as possible. It seems he's on schedule as well. Once we have a public version that we can compile. We have to wait for the Paper fork, as well as plugin owners to update. Meanwhile we have to convert worlds and update our policies, rules and documentation. This whole process will take time. We're not talking hours or days, this could potentially be over a week. I hope early July that we are making progress.

Question: But the other server already has 1.16?
Answer: You're free to play where you like, we're doing what we're capable of doing, and can't make things go any faster than they go. We want to be on 1.16 as well. We just have hundreds of gigabytes of worlds to convert, many features we wish to keep working, and we want to provide the same type of performance, as well as guarantee your data to be there (your builds and inventories, etc). We do not reset perm worlds, but we do reset temp worlds. Finally, I do this basically 90% on my own, I honestly am doing the best I can. Playing with 1.15.2 will continue to work until we're on 1.16.x. Hopefully this makes it fun for you to stick around.

Question: I could connect with 1.16, but none of the new stuff is there !!
Answer: Correct, at some point we will support both 1.15 and 1.16 clients to connect to our server during a grace period. The engine is still 1.15.2 until we've fully converted. This makes it easier so you don't have to constantly flip between profiles. When we're on 1.15.2 we strongly recommend using a 1.15.2 profile though. When you login to the game the content of /motd is shown. It will tell you what version of 1MB we're on. Either 1MB 2.7.3 for 1.15.2 or 1MB 2.8.x for 1.16.x

Question: I hear talks about new worlds?
Answer: Correct. We're preparing the new /wild world for 1.16 (you can already visit it if you want) And also, we're going to introduce a new perm world for the nether where we invite players to explore, play and survive. We're looking forward to your bases there.

Question: I am running out of homes to set though.
Answer: Don't worry, once we understand the 1.16 game mechanics a bit better we will either have a new way to set a beacon point to teleport with, or we will provide an additional home (or two) to group(s). Maybe it will be possible to 'rank up' and earn additional homes. We've yet to decide the best approach.

Question: Will you convert to 1.17 later this year?
Answer: Okay, we're getting ahead of ourselves. Yes, we wish to stay current with Minecraft, but let's focus on 1.16 first.

 

[Floris]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcHiRdrsAfk

https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/article/nether-update-java

Update:

Connecting to 1moreblock.com:25565 with Minecraft 1.16.1 is now possible.

Our Minecraft engine is still 1.15.2, so we strongly recommend using the vanilla Minecraft 1.15.2 launcher and client.

 

[Floris]

Update:

- Mojang released Minecraft version 1.16.1.
- We will discontinue support for 1.16.0.
- If you wish to connect to 1MB, currently please use 1.15.2 or 1.16.1
- Spigot has not yet released version 1.16 of their jar.
- We can not yet get Spigot or Paper as server engine.
- We can not yet test world conversion properly, or test and build plugins for 1.16

 

[Floris]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfYYTyRl_0g


Upgrading a server really isn't just flipping a switch

 

[Floris]

Update:

Spigot has released version 1.16.1, we're now testing plugins, and soon world conversions.

 

[Floris]

Update:

Roberto is going through the worlds on our network, including the 1MB worlds, to do an initial testing conversion to try and find bugs and chunk corruption. Once we're confident enough things are okay, we're going to make final conversions and give that a go.

I am going through all the plugins we use on the network, including the 1MB features, just an initial test. Soon I will start converting data from 1.15.2 to 1.16.1 using these plugins and try to find serious bugs etc. If things look promising, I am going to give it a go to try live-data (on our cloned setup)

 

[Floris]

Update:

The worlds we use the least have been converted and are being used in tests, etc. We've (for now) restricted access to these worlds.
The worlds you can still use until we're ready to convert:
/spawn
/general
and the resource worlds: /nether, /end, and /mine.

 

[Floris]

Update:

The 1MB 2.7.3, Minecraft 1.15.2 -live- server has been taken offline.
All the worlds and user-data has been converted, we're now converting the last world: /general
Almost all the plugins have been updated to 1.16.1 support.

The grace period (days, not weeks) has started, at any time we have a reason within this week to revert back to 1.15.2 we will.

Please come online this week to test your homes, warps, commands, bases, chests, etc. And report back issues, missing commands, or broken features.

We will frequently restart to try and fix bugs. We will try to do this in between sessions, and if there's people online we try to announce it in-game first.

https://omgboards.com/threads/minecraft-changelog.261770/page-8#post-759430

 

[Floris]

If you're interested in the progress, there's a temporary upgrade progress channel on discord now.

 

[Floris]

Update:

The convert took a few hours longer, because I was also doing other stuff that took up some CPU cycles, but that doesn't matter.

We're on 1.16.1 now.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT:

If we find a reason to roll back to 1.15.2, in the next few days, we will.

If we find NO reason to roll back, we will stick to 1.16.1 and move forward, removing the option to rollback.

Please use the next few days to check everything you think requires checking, and if you have an issue or question, please use this thread or the bug-report channel on discord.


(screenshots are for nostalgia reasons)

 

[Floris]

The end of September is here, a new season is about to start, we're jumping in early with the Fall Update 2020, which includes dropping 1.16.1 and 1.16.2 connectivity and going full on 1.16.3.