Image Redacted

We're having some technical issues with the shot for this blog entry, but the smaller cameras are still online and functioning normally. A few changes noticed in the past 24 hours:

A new building has been erected in Hyde Square, this time on Castle St. The new Earthen Materials Shoppe has been started, but there is no roof and no contents within. It has also closed the entrance to the Undercity at Library and Castle. Exactly what the final solution to that issue is is unclear.

Also, a section of wall is now missing from the wall surrounding the spawn point. There have been reports of the spawn point drifting south, so this may be in response to that change.

Oh yes, and finally, Caffeinix submitted a video to be shared with the community, demonstrating the new auto-harvesting farm at Fort Beta.

Ace Of Fours: The Best Hand

Yesterday WHEATLEY, the new dedicated Minecraft server, finally arrived and was configured. The past day or so has been something of a shakedown cruise. A clean, new Ubuntu install needs a surprising amount of supervision to get Minecraft up and running properly, and considerably more to get the mapping software going. But hopefully all that is done now and the increased memory allocation is working well. HAL9000 is staying as the stand-by server for a while, but I expect to reallocate it to other tasks soon. It is possible WHEATLEY will need a quick rebuild in the next few days to handle a bit architecture issue, so until that is resolved, I'll be keeping its predecessor ready to go.

In terms of construction, a few experimental new dirt gantries have gone up near Hyde's Tower, and more doors, portals, and windows have been made in the walls. Most distressingly, though, is the large bullseye that's been installed at the corner of Wells and Trowbridge. What's that all about?

Hyde's Tower Rail Depot (Hyde Park)

Security patches to the Hyde's Tower perimeter and internal spawn points are underway, so I thought I'd take this opportunity to do another building write-up on another structure we use on a regular basis: the train station in Hyde's Tower.

Hyde's Tower Rail Depot

Opened: 3 March 2011

Structure Built By Bronzite 2-3 March 2011

Switching Computer Built by MikeXIV 12 March 2011

Connections: Government Center Station, South Station

North Annex Built By Bronzite 6 March 2011

Shortly after the switching computer at Government Center Station was completed, the rail line from Government Center to Hyde's Tower was built, but missed the town perimeter. Rather than attempt to run the line into the already over-crowded civic building, a new station was built east of the city on 2 March, and completed the next day. Until the 8th, the only safe means of access to the station was a tunnel connecting the subbasement to the the Spiral-Hyde tunnel. On 8 March the first expansion of Hyde's Tower's original wall encompassed the station's site, providing a safe land route to the station.

When originally built, the Rail Depot had a very primitive launcher capable of propelling a Minecart to Government Central Station. The original design was plagued by undershooting issues, resulting in the cart stopping halfway to its destination. MikeXIV, our resident rail engineer, was on vacation, and was unable to install a proper switching computer until his return. At the time the Y70 protocol was being discussed, so while the line to Government Center Station was (at the time) Y70 compliant, the line south was simply taken below the southern wall and connected to the existing rail line to the spawn. That bypass would remain in place until the Central Forest line replaced the Causeway Co-line on the 16th.

The station's tower is currently the second highest observation site in the city (the highest being the eponymous tower.) Although tools and materials have occasionally been stored there, the building has never served a secondary function. Much of the southern Undercity was initially built around the foundation of the Rail Depot. The tunnels originally constructed to allow access during the time the station was outside the city walls are still there, although rarely used. Although the station has been plagued by booster stalls, the redstone circuitry is almost completely in the same configuration it was when the computer was first built.

There are currently no plans to modify or demolish the station, although recently there have been questions of a major reconfiguration of the rail network within Hyde's Tower. The Rail Depot has become a fixture of life in Hyde's Tower, and is still the entry point for most travelers. It, or something like it, will likely be there as long as Hyde's Tower is inhabited.

The Street Where You Live

The new eastern expansion of Hyde's Tower has streets down on it now. Building has otherwise not started in that are yet. Also, be advised that the southeast corner of the city is not monster proof; there have been instances of at least spiders jumping from the hill to the wall, and a few other mobs in the city limits may have entered that way, so keep an eye out in that part of town.

In the larger scope of the world, a large section of the south that was previously not snow-covered now is. For reasons unclear, a climate shift has placed Fort Beta and the surrounding countryside in a snow-ridden tundra. The zone extends north to the latitude of the Southern Wilds, roughly following the Causeway. Ice now forms on the southwestern inlets of the lake between the Southern Wilds and Fort Beta. It is unclear at this time if the snow zone is moving or static. Further observations are requested.

So Much Cake

A great deal has happened on the server over the weekend. First off, Hyde's Tower has again been expanded, this time to the East, and now straddles the channel that separated it from the landmass Government Central Station is on. The new land has been flattened and is ready for development. In addition, a few new buildings have been constructed in the city. A Woodworks now stands on Trowbridge Street next to the Arsenal, and next door to that MikeXIV built a treehouse. Just around the corner, Turtletuttle erected a building in the form of a cake, a building filled with cakes. It is most creative.

The rail system has seen considerable development as well. The continuous mainline now reaches from Northrend in the north to the Southern Wilds in the south. Everything south of Hyde's Tower is now electrified rail, while the lines to the north are still running on conventional boosters. The new arrangement has made South Station even more vulnerable than in the past to bounceback caused by a cart already waiting the the station when a new one arrives (in fact, bounceback under such circumstances is virtually guaranteed.) Also, the line through the Central Forest has proven vulnerable to creepers for some reason in a way it wasn't before, and a large section of track is missing and has yet to be replaced.

Finally, because a few people have requested it, I've added a Minecraft Hardware Fund tracker to the sidebar of the Blog. It doesn't auto-update, but it is tied into the spreadsheet I use to track the fund, so it is as accurate as my records.

There has also been a somewhat odd development on the boundaries of the world. A large number of cliff faces when exploring new terrain implies either the world seed or the algorithm used to create terrain may have changed. More observations from individuals in the Deep Range would be appreciated in determining what's happening at the edges of our space.

Stability Is For Suckers

1.5_02 continues to hurl End of Stream errors at random, and sometimes just flatout crashes. The forums are awash in a flood of conflicting reports on the various issues in 1.5, 1.5_01, and 1.5_02. To make matters worse, the world appears to be corrupting again, as the spawn point has again been replaced with a randomly generated block. I'm not planning to roll back this time, though, so effecting repairs to that may be the order of the day.

Mojang appears to be asleep at the wheel, or at least wildly unresponsive. If anybody wants to help me figure this out, the error that's repeatedly taking out our server is:

java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: Java heap space

at java.util.Arrays.copyOf(Arrays.java:2734)

at java.util.ArrayList.ensureCapacity(ArrayList.java:167)

at java.util.ArrayList.add(ArrayList.java:351)

at cp.b(SourceFile:19)

at ly.d(SourceFile:355)

at ly.a(SourceFile:350)

at da.a(SourceFile:802)

at kr.c(SourceFile:335)

at gu.a(SourceFile:484)

at gu.u(SourceFile:595)

at ee.u(SourceFile:26)

at dl.u(SourceFile:42)

at gu.p_(SourceFile:209)

at ee.p_(SourceFile:30)

at da.a(SourceFile:1087)

at dg.a(SourceFile:34)

at da.g(SourceFile:1063)

at da.e(SourceFile:1042)

at net.minecraft.server.MinecraftServer.h(SourceFile:350)

at net.minecraft.server.MinecraftServer.run(SourceFile:286)

at bj.run(SourceFile:394)

Generally the path of execution is:

1. Server starts normally.
2. Players log in and play normally.
3. Server begins refusing players (End of Stream error).
4. Server throws OutOfMemory and ceases all network communication.
5. Admin logs in and bounces server.

I believe that the OutOfMemory error is where our world corruption is coming from, but I can't be sure.

End of Stream

As many of you are aware, Minecraft 1.5_02 continues to have some performance anxiety, manifesting itself in sometime not allowing connections. Again, the issue appears weather-related. Speaking of weather, I got an update on the new server. The good news is the new hardware shipped yesterday. The bad news is that apparently due to thunderstorms in Memphis, FedEx doesn't expect it here before the 27th. Such is life.

There have been a few more exciting notes as time advances. One is the Arcopolis boosters are showing a much higher likelihood of reversing incoming or outgoing carts unexpectedly. Also, there was a lightning storm this morning over Hyde's Tower. While nothing was seriously damaged, at least one strike briefly started a fire that the rain immediately extinguished. Even so, these storms present a new fire hazard that we hadn't needed to deal with before. Keep these changes in mind in future construction. The cobblestone roofs most of the buildings have seem adequate defense.

World of Ruin

Yesterday Minecraft 1.5 came out, and proved to be hideously unstable. We suffered serious corruption issues and server networking issues. Today's image shows the server just before it was rolled back this morning. After I announced the rollback last night pending on the new patch, some of our denizens went about making themselves useful by testing the susceptibility of our towns to fire. You may notice in today's picture that Park Avenue is a burnt out wreck.

Minecraft 1.5_01 client and server have come out, and the server is now patched. With luck, we won't have any more issues with server corruption. Be vigilant, though, and if problems persist we will continue to roll back to the Last Known Good Configuration, which is currently 19 April at 1100 EDT.

Cheap Obsidian

A few important notes for today. First off it, if appears the facility down at the end of the Glass Path has caught a bad case of Flood. I am sure this is by design, and the current plans for Ark-building are extraneous.

Second, there is a new building in Hyde Square, called the Obsidian Works. This building contains a new class of furnace that converts redstone into obsidian. It is by far the cheapest method of obtaining obsidian we have, and I recommend it to anybody who requires obsidian in any quantity. As with any process involving pouring lava, please exercise the utmost caution in using the Obsidian Works -- lava will not only kill you, but also destroy your stuff.

Finally, I've been asked to pass a comment on about construction in Hyde's Tower. Awells has done a marvelous job expanding the city walls, but he asks that people building new lots in Hyde's Tower avoid structures that physically connect with the walls. These make it more difficult to maintain the walls, and when it comes time to move them again, these buildings might be inadvertently damaged. The Hyde's Tower Building Code has been added to the Wall of Policy at the library. It should, of course, be noted, that the code there applies only to Hyde's Tower, while the Y70 protocol applies only to mainline railroads (not to the Fort Beta rail line or other personal railroads), and that the only global rule on the server remains Don't Be A Dick. This concludes today's presentation on server, transportation, and city ordinances.

Monuments Are Not Born, They Are Constructed

So, I constructed a sheep. A big one. A magenta one. Here's what it looked like over the course of its construction. To see it in person, just take the train from Government Center north towards the Doom Fortress. It isn't lit, so please be careful around it at night.

-MikeXIV

Yeah, So.... Sheep

Perhaps it is just because I see the image almost everyday, and I'm getting better at finding differences, but today's major feature is a giant, magenta sheep that has been constructed on the Government Center Station/Doom Fortress line. MikeXIV has built a tremendous animal of a colorful nature beside the tracks, using a prodigious quantity of dyed wool.

Meanwhile, the frenzy of construction at Hyde's Tower seems to have slowed over the weekend, with just a few additions being made to the Deli. Much construction seems to be happening either underground or in the Deep Range at this point.

With Bated Breath

The announcement that 1.5 is soon to be here has caused something of a slowdown in construction. Acamilo began running rail toward Northrend out of the Doom Fortress. The Doom Fortress is connected to Government Center Station as well, but be warned: there's nothing to stop you at Doom Fortress -- you'll keep going all the way to the end of the partially-constructed line to Northrend (although a booster near the end means you can head back easily enough.) The Doom Fortress station will likely not be built until 1.5 to take advantage of the new technologies becoming available. The fate of South Station, Hyde Park, and most importantly, Government Center, are undecided at this time. The boosters have the occasion to break (Hyde Park being the most notorious for this), but especially GCS is a monument to creative engineering. Stay tuned.

Where The Sidewalk Ends

Not a huge amount of new construction recently, but yesterday we discovered an interesting mystery. I logged on in the afternoon to find a section of sidewalk in front of the deli was missing. I checked with the other users logged on and nobody could account for it. It looks for all the world like somebody got blown up by multiple creepers trying to dig out from the deli's basement into Undercity North. If this was you, let us know. I'd like to secure Hyde's Tower against mobs of all types, especially creepers.

Domed Is Not The Same As Doomed

There have been two major constructions in the last day, both in Hyde's Tower as the city continues to expand to fill its new perimeter. The first is the new Deli going up on Park Ave. The second is my new house, just north of Xyzav's elemental castle in Hyde's Tower. It is a glass dome. I like it.

Yesterday I finally ordered a new server for our world. The manufacturer tells me I can expect it to arrive on or abouts 20 April. We'll see if I can pull myself away from Portal 2 long enough to get it up and running.

Southbound

I don't get outside the 1000m circle much these days, but recently I took a walk south from the Southern Wilds. Heading straight out on that bearing actually reveals a progression of interesting buildings that haven't been covered at all on this blog. Of course, Fort Beta is there, and slowly growing, but there are towers, floating islands with waterfalls, lava spires, and at the end of the line, a rather large castle with wonderful architecture. If you find yourself between projects, I recommend making the trip.

In Hyde's Tower, construction continues apace. A squat arsenal has been built on Trowbridge Street, and a deli is now being built on Park. Across town, a second brick and sandstone building is going up near the foundry, this one apparently a cactus farm. The city's growth continues unabated, and it will soon be quite large.

The need for a new server is also growing rapidly, with disk space now becoming critically low (6%). I am taking active steps to this end.

Everywhere and Nowhere

The second set of townhouses in Hyde's Tower has been completed. Xyzav continues to build his elemental castles around the world. There's now a collection box outside the Hyde's Tower Rail Depot taking up a collection for the rail line to Northrend. All that's just the changes in the city itself.

On the extreme southeast edge of the 1000m circle is a new building in the high mountains, red and white. Its purpose is largely unknown at this point. There's a new lava mass south of the lava dock. Finally, there's some activity starting to happen in a field just south of the Doom Fortress. Exactly what is unclear.

Green Acres Is The Place To Be

Hyde's Tower has continued to evolve. On then east side of the new space, a large area called Hyde's Square has been set up, with designated lots awaiting new construction. To the west, the second set of townhouses (and apparently a museum) are slowly going up. Finally a tiny, squat castle of some description has also been built in the city. Expansion is rapidly continuing.

The Diving Platform in the lake south of Castle Wells has also been expanded, and now as a minicastle much the same as the one now in Hyde's Tower. The Causeway has also been expanded south to Fort Beta. Also, at long last, it appears works is continuing at the Clockwork Citadel, which had remained dormant for over a month. Exactly what will come of the site remains to be seen.

Leveling and Building

The new area in Hyde's Tower has finally been leveled, but now there seems to be a great shortage of dirt in the world. For a considerable length of time in Hyde's Tower yesterday, Obsidian was in more ready supply than simple ground. The new ground, however, has proven a fertile supply of passive mobs and wolves. Wool supplies have been replenishing rapidly.

Also, it appears somebody is beginning the construction of a new set of townhouses behind the currently existing row. The boundary markers for each unit have been put down, although the foundation has not yet been dug. The former trend of dispersal we thought we might see with the presence of beds might, in fact, be reversing, as it appears more and more players who had been in the Deep Range are now spending considerable hourage in Hyde's Tower.

Greater Space

Again, Hyde's Tower's wall has been expanded, now almost spanning the peninsula the city is on. It is unclear what the new space is going to be utilized for, but there is a lot of it. The whole of Castle Wells could fit inside the new space that's been opened up.

Also, the Treasure Hunt is over. Xyvaz located the wreck, and send me screenshots to prove it. The redacted tale of his hunt:

The first attempt to find the sunken treasure yielded nothing. I searched all the major bodies of water within the 1km radius finding nothing. I even searched the other side of the south east sea. At the other end I found a tree on a cliff which I was gravitated to. I was drawing on night so I build a home out of dirt on the cliff side to hole up the night. in the morning I found I was besought by a creeper. so I build a land bridge out from the cliff and watched as the creeper plummeted to his demise.

After that I looked south, I heard rumors of deep lakes in the south. Since the only clue I had was it had sunk in 15m of water (which it was more like 10m) I went south. I searched until I had found fort beta, on foot!

I hadn't searched in a few days, building my grass tower, hollowing out a tunnel to an under water castle, extending the causeway to beta. Then there were more clues so I headed out again.

The clues said it was beyond 1km from spawn, which I had already determined, and that it was withing 500m of the causeway. This is where I started my search at the ends of the causeway. At the end I chose I had found a trail of torches, following it to a shed and mine that emc and made when he got lost in the wild. I used this as a way station as I searched the surround wilderness for large bodies of water. I also found a cliff side safe house above the clouds. Unfortunately as I tried to escape a creep destroyed the entrance (sorry Bronzite I tried to repair it.)

As I searched I started to head north and I found many things to the north, mushrooms, flowers and my first pumpkin patch! After a while I found a glass cottage from where I could steal a few winks before I headed further north. I followed the XXXXX road, checking to the west since one clue said also to check to the west.

Then I found the shadow of a ship in the deep and I dived to explore it, carrying my trusty Jack-O-Lantern with me to light the way as I carefully found my way into the hull, where I found my treasure.

Urban Sprawl

The major event of the last 24 hours has been the abrupt expansion of the Hyde's Tower city wall to encompass more than twice as much area as it did previously. Awells took it upon himself to grant more living space to the now-crowded city, and much of the jungle north of the city has now been claimed, along with some of the eastern reaches. The northern wing is still being cleared and leveled, but the new east end is ready for construction.

Speaking of construction, the Library of Hyde's Tower was also completed. It has three walls of knowledge in it: The Wall of History, the Wall of Policy, and the Wall of Science, to record historical events, local and world rules and policies, and observations and practical information, respectively. Signs are available either on the walls or in a nearby chest.

Incidentally, the client was updated today as well, but just to remove the April Fool's Day joke.

TREASURE HUNT CLUE: The Site is less than 500m from the Causeway.

Constructive Drift

Again, little to report from the Satellite feed. The Library continues construction, slowly, in Hyde's Tower. In the south, a platform was placed atop the aforementioned spire coming out of the sea.

A few notes on safety in the new patch. We've had a few incidents of water ladders no longer being quite as safe as they were in previous patches. Please utilize caution when using them, especially in places where they terminate on something that is harder than you are. In addition, it appears the water swim physics have been updated, so don't trust in your ability to outswim a river leading into a waterfall. Finally, for those of you with bows and a pack of wolves at your command: Wolves don't appreciate suicidal actions on the part of their masters. If you strike yourself with an arrow because you were doing something silly (like shooting straight up in the air) you will be torn asunder by a pack of previously tamed dogs.

TREASURE HUNT CLUE: The site is more than 1000m from Spawn.

Skygrass

Two major new developments on the big map today: a new Library is being constructed in Hyde's Tower, and a mysterious tower of grass is being constructed in the waters south of the Clockwork Citadel. In additional, the spire has been removed from the Foundry in Hyde's Tower, but the facility has begun smelting with first answering the tremendous demand for stone that has come of late. Construction appears to have halted on the Everything Farm, leading some to question if it will ever be completed.

TREASURE HUNT CLUE: The site is west of Government Center Station.

South Station

Yesterday we tried upgrading the server memory again and once again it was rejected. This time I had knowledgable witnesses on-hand to confirm I was doing everything right and the server was just being contrary. If there are any users out there with useful suggestions, I'm officially soliciting ideas for what might be helpful in resolving the situation. In the meantime I'm also following up on more extreme measures of improving server performance. Updates will come. In the meantime, our write up on South Station!

South Station

Construction Started: 12 February 2011

Construction Completed: 18 Feb 2011

Built By: MikeXIV

Service Line: Red

South Station was the first of the major rail hubs in our world. It originally was built as a prototype station, a template for future stations. It exhibited the first "perpetual motion" mine cart booster, as well as the first push-button destination selection, which we now see in all mainline stations.

South Station also proved a sort of revival for the Spiral Fortress, to which it is connected by both a water ladder/walkway as well as a subway. It also provided through-service to the Southern Wilds. Although it has since been eclipsed in complexity by Government Center Station, South Station still holds an important place in the history of our world as the first of the major purpose-built rail stations, and still sees considerable traffic as travelers take the surface route south from Hyde's Tower.

Sails and Bricks

Since our last Dispatch, two major events have happened in our world. First, Constitution has finally raised sail, after a long period of collecting sufficient wool. Second, a new 36-furnace foundry/porkchop grill has opened in Hyde's Tower, to help with the occasionally need for mass smelting we encounter for major projects.

One question I've been getting of late was if this blog will cover events that happen outside of the 1000m circle around the original spawn we now call Civilization (now a somewhat outdated name.) To be honest, it is hard for me to keep up with the rest of the world and keep the time I spend on this blog to a reasonable level. It is my hope that when a new cultural center arises somewhere in the Deep Range, be it Fort Beta or Northrend or some other facility, somebody will take up the opportunity to make posts about what's happening in that part of the world, as well.

TREASURE HUNT CLUE: The hulk sank in 15 meters of water.