Minecraft Server Toolkit

This is a basic Ansible playbook to create an on-demand Minecraft server on DigitalOcean that uses Block Storage to persist game data. This allows you to shut down the server when not in use without affecting your world or in-game inventory data.

Dependencies

• Python 2.7.x

Installation of Python via pyenv is recommended -- it will automatically use the version specified in .python-version once installed.

Setup

Before you can provision your new server, you'll need to ensure that the necessary dependencies and credentials are installed:

Dependencies

Setup automation is provided by make, simply run the setup target:

$ make setup

This will ensure that your local configuration files are in place and that all necessary Python and Ansible dependencies are installed.

Credentials

Once dependencies are installed, you will need to edit the vars/credentials.yml file and provide your DigitalOcean API key:

---
credentials:
  digital_ocean:
    api_key: d34db33f

This playbook can also create a DNS entry using the DNSimple service. If you are a a DNSimple customer, you can configure your credentials in vars/credentials.yml as well:

---
credentials:
  digital_ocean:
    api_key: d34db33f
  dnsimple:
    email: user@host.com
    api_key: t0k3n

Configuration

Server Creation

Sensible defaults have been chosen for the server creation options, but you can always override those as needed:

# vars/server.yml
server:
  ssh_key_name: "Ansible / Minecraft"
  image_id: ubuntu-16-04-x64
  region_id: nyc3
  size_id: 4gb
  name: minecraft

Minecraft Server Configuration

You can also tweak your Minecraft server settings based on the variables provided by the included Ansible role:

See the documentation for the devops-coop.minecraft Ansible role for all available options.

Configuring DNS Records (Optional)

If you have credentials set for DNSimple, you can configure the domain and hostname of the record that will be created -- this will point to your newly created server:

# vars/server.yml
dns:
  domain: my-domain.com
  hostname: minecraft
  ttl: 300

Creating the Server

Ensure that all dependencies are installed, and then run the provision target to create your new server:

$ make provision

When successful, your new server will be ready to use -- you can either try using the created hostname if you are using DNSimple, or the IP captured in the inventory file to connect.

Destroying the Server

It's important to shut down the Minecraft server process and unmount the Block Storage volume before deleting the server. To do this correctly, you just need to run the destroy target:

$ make destroy