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Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

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Re: Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

#121

Post by haunter »

armchairhacker wrote: post #2

Minecraft, Roblox, Geometry Dash, Trackmania...these are games that succeeded because of their communities. Alone, they don't provide much for the average player, but creative players build interesting things that appeal to everyone. I think one of the reasons Vision Pro and metaverse have been struggling is because their engines are bad. Not just locked down, but hard to develop on (although I don't have personal ex…

> these are games that succeeded because of their communities

To me an interesting thing when a game succedes despite its community. As if people can endure a lot of toxicity as long as the game is good

Re: Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

#122

Post by karlding »

pphysch wrote: post #110
userbinator wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More proof that you don't need the source code to modify software. Then again, Java has always been easy to decompile, and IMHO the biggest obstacle to understanding is the "object-oriented obfuscation" that's inherent in large codebases even when you have the original source.

Agreed; modding obfuscated Java is impressive, but not quite on the level of modding in the (Nintendo) emulation community. The things that have been achieved with classic Nintendo titles are absurd, like adding high-performance online multiplayer to Super Smash Bro. Melee.

Said online multiplayer [0].

The devs also wrote a write-up here about how they handle the desyncs in netcode [1].

[0] https://slippi.gg/

[1] https://medium.com/project-slippi/fighting-desyncs-in-melee-...

Re: Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

#124

Post by quamserena »

1313ed01 wrote: post #70
NelsonMinar wrote: post #51

It's extraordinary to me that Minecraft is both the game that has the most robust mod community out there and that the modders were working from obfuscated, decompiled Java binaries. With elaborate tooling to deobfuscate and then reobfuscate using the same mangled names. For over a decade! What dedication.

I am terrified by Minecraft mods always being distributed from dodgy download sites and not rarely come with their own Windows EXE installers. And as far as I know there is no sandboxing at all in the game (uhm, no pun intended) so once installed the mod has full access to your computer?

Yeah mods are just regular Java .jars that can do anything. To circumvent this issue Mojang introduced datapacks but they are super limited in what they can do. They’re basically just Minecraft commands in a file along with some manifest files to change e.g. mob loot drop rates. These Minecraft commands are Turing complete but a huge PITA to work with directly, no concept of local variables or if statements, no network access, etc. Every entity in MC has associated NBT data that is similar to JSON that stores values like position, velocity, inventory, etc. You can change NBT with commands for mobs, but in what can only be described as a religious decision, Minecraft commands are unable to modify player NBT. So for example it is impossible to impart a velocity on a player.

One wonders why Mojang didn’t embed Lua or Python or something and instead hand-rolled an even shittier version of Bash. The only reason MC servers like Hypixel exist is because the community developed an API on top of the vanilla jar that makes plugin development easy. Even with that there is still no way for servers to run client-side code, severely limiting what you can do. They could’ve easily captured all of Roblox’s marketshare but just let that opportunity slip through their fingers. Through this and a series of other boneheaded decisions (huge breaking changes, changes to the base game, lack of optimization), they have seriously fractured their ecosystem:

- PvP is in 1.8 (a version from 2015) or sometimes even 1.7 (from 2013)

- Some technical Minecraft is latest, some is in 1.12 (from 2017)

- Adventure maps are latest version

- Casual players play Bedrock (an entirely different codebase!)

The words “stable API” have never been said in the Mojang offices. So the community made their own for different versions, servers use the Bukkit 1.8 API, client 1.8 mods use Forge, latest mods use Forge or Fabric. The deobfuscated names are of little utility because the old names are so well ingrained, and modders will also probably avoid them for legal reasons.

Re: Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

#125

Post by pdntspa »

1313ed01 wrote: post #70
NelsonMinar wrote: post #51

It's extraordinary to me that Minecraft is both the game that has the most robust mod community out there and that the modders were working from obfuscated, decompiled Java binaries. With elaborate tooling to deobfuscate and then reobfuscate using the same mangled names. For over a decade! What dedication.

I am terrified by Minecraft mods always being distributed from dodgy download sites and not rarely come with their own Windows EXE installers. And as far as I know there is no sandboxing at all in the game (uhm, no pun intended) so once installed the mod has full access to your computer?

Yes, much like how most software for PC has been written since the beginning of time?

Re: Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

#126

Post by mikkupikku »

xp84 wrote: post #120
1313ed01 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am terrified by Minecraft mods always being distributed from dodgy download sites and not rarely come with their own Windows EXE installers. And as far as I know there is no sandboxing at all in the game (uhm, no pun intended) so once installed the mod has full access to your computer?

As someone whose kid has pulled me into the world of using mods (though not (yet) making them for Java Edition) I think this PSA is worth sharing of how to use minecraft mods without pain and with minimal risk, in case anyone is getting started, or has gotten started and finds it frustrating: 1. Use MultiMC to manage instances with various mods, since mods are rarely compatible with each other, and since each version…

If you're using MuliMC or one of its various forks, you can search for and install mods from modrinth or curseforge right in the launcher. I fine it more convienent than doing it with a browser and dragging them in, but either way works.

Re: Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

#127

Post by OkayPhysicist »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #6

I wonder if they'll ever just open source the Java Edition on GitHub. People will buy Minecraft on every platform it is released on, just like Skyrim.

At this point, they could open source it, and just charge for Minecraft accounts being able to authenticate with their login servers to join authenticated Minecraft servers, and it wouldn't change sales much.

Re: Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

#128

Post by ed_elliott_asc »

userbinator wrote: post #90
NelsonMinar wrote: post #51

It's extraordinary to me that Minecraft is both the game that has the most robust mod community out there and that the modders were working from obfuscated, decompiled Java binaries. With elaborate tooling to deobfuscate and then reobfuscate using the same mangled names. For over a decade! What dedication.

More proof that you don't need the source code to modify software. Then again, Java has always been easy to decompile, and IMHO the biggest obstacle to understanding is the "object-oriented obfuscation" that's inherent in large codebases even when you have the original source.

Tbh decompiling software and figuring out how it works isn’t easy but that is part of the fun :) - it’s the reason ive ended up following many of the weird paths in computing that I have

Re: Minecraft removing obfuscation in Java Edition

#130

Post by quamserena »

Macha wrote: post #10
pwdisswordfishy wrote: post #4

> But we encourage people to get creative both in Minecraft and with Minecraft – so in 2019 we tried to make this tedious process a little easier by releasing “obfuscation mappings”. These mappings were essentially a long list that allowed people to match the obfuscated terms to un-obfuscated terms. This alleviated the issue a little, as modders didn’t need to puzzle out what everything did, or what it should be call…

A lot of mod tooling was built around the obfuscated or community names for those APIs.

Still is for legal reasons. Also the community names (Yarn) come with javadoc that actually explains what the function does
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