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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-01-11, 17:59

A potential, universal, solution:

http://dev.bukkit.org/bukkit-plugins/chunkload/

This plugin will allow Brad and Turtle to establish the chunks around the mob trap as 'spawn-like' which should keep the redstone processing until all users logoff. In essence, you'll still be able to /back from the trap and these other weird redstone getting stuck bugs shouldn't happen as frequently; hopefully at all...
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-02-18, 16:35

So unless the mobtrap chunks are permanently loaded ala spawn, tping will always be a problem. My solution for the nether portal access is to essentially force the filters to turn off when people are leaving the trap. This means that you will have to walk over a pressure pad or through tripwires to activate the filters, and over the pad again to de-activate them. I want this to happen every time someone enters the trap through the nether portal. For the moment the filters are permanently off to allow me the chance to build the redstone infrastructure to allow this capability.

After I am done with this modification, I will re-open the trap for a limited time basis, say a week, to see how screwed up things get when people are only accessing the trap through the nether portal. If problems develop, I will once again close the trap so it behooves you to not tp or /back anywhere near the trap or from chunks where the trap is loaded. Basically if you are in, under or over the north ocean, you cannot /back without screwing up the trap. (this is easier to remember than the more limited reality).
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-02-23, 16:17

So it was written, so it was done.

There are some changes to the mob trap. I pushed the portal back a way from the trap because spawning pigmen were causing serious problems with the way the redstone in the new mechanism was working. So as you enter through the nether you will end up in a portal room, if you find a pigman in this new room, be kind and kill it. Passing through the iron doors gets you into the familiar hallway.


2014-02-23_22.10.26 by billybobsky, on Flickr


There are two likely scenarios you will encounter:

1) You see the hallway and two trip wires, proceed to your destination with confidence. A 3x3 door will shut behind you after you pass over the second trip wire. Don't worry, you can get out, this is just there to remind you that the filters are now active and ANY use of /tp or /back will cause the redstone in the filters to bug out and me to be pissed off. Never leave when this door is closed through any means.


2014-02-23_22.10.40 by billybobsky, on Flickr


2) You see a small stretch of hallway sealed by a 3x3 door with one trip wire in front of it -- this means someone is either at the trap or they did a bad bad thing. Proceed towards the door with confidence. It will open. After you pass over the second trip wire, the door will close behind you. The filters are now active.


2014-02-23_22.11.12 by billybobsky, on Flickr


2014-02-23_22.11.19 by billybobsky, on Flickr

When leaving there are now two possibilities:

1) The door that closed behind you is still shut. Proceed with confidence over the tripwire. Wait at the door until it opens -- it is timed to let the redstone in the trap settle -- and proceed to portal.


2014-02-23_22.11.34 by billybobsky, on Flickr

2) The door that closed behind you is now open. Presumably someone left in the interim. When you pass over the nearest tripwire the door will close. Wait a short bit and step back on the tripwire and the door will open.


2014-02-23_22.11.50 by billybobsky, on Flickr



I will leave the trap open for business until March 10, at which point I will assess whether this mechanism of protecting the filters has had its desired result. In the meantime, please post a message here if you find any bugs with the way the trap is working at all -- including obvious filter problems and/or door not working properly.
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-02-24, 06:40

I found a bug. The off-only trip wire needed a pulse limiter...
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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2014-02-24, 10:28

Arrrrooows! UNLIMITED arrrooows!

**End nod to lame Lucas movie**
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-03-04, 19:21

An AN Interim Report: The mob trap is still functioning completely normally aside from a single stuck comparator on a overflow eliminator (it is possible that this stuck comparator is a remnant of previous chunk unloading errors, but it doesn't have to be). This could lead to issues down the line (though not catastrophic as such for a while), so I am considering approaches that would also allow the redstone in those circuits to get reset when the trap is activated.

Technical considerations: The overflow eliminators are the weakest point in the adaptive design. If they get stocked with drops, it is possible that they will simply be unloaded/loaded incorrectly. In an extreme case, where drops are backed up throughout the transport line, the filters could fail as well from the same redstone bug. So it is something that does mildly concern me. As long as the overflow eliminators are working things should be fine. The worse case scenario might have me add additional overflow eliminating capacity to each of the output lines just to be sure all of the drops in the lines are eliminated or stored before the chunks unload upon a player exiting the trap. ... I might do this anyway, just for shits and giggles.
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2014-03-04, 20:12

While you're shitting and giggling why don't you write a version of your last post so that a 4-year old could understand it. I will then get one of them to explain it to me O.o


EDIT:
I have a cold or I have wicked allergies, but either way my initial post wasn't intended as being flippant.
I'd really like to understand this completely. I might understand it if I didn't have this tremendous sneezing and watering eyes and such.


...

Steve Jobs ate my cat's watermelon.
Captain Drew on Twitter

Last edited by drewprops : 2014-03-04 at 21:59.
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-03-05, 05:50

ok... If i have time I will diagram the trap's redstone.
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-03-10, 19:15

It is 10 March, and I have the obligation to announce that the trap is open for business indefinitely (until something breaks).

Two ground rules (and a request):
1) Enter and exit only through the Nether (and leave the trap if the server is about to restart), as described above.

2) Do not use /back or /tp while at the trap.

Request: If you find drops collecting in chests in which they are not meant to be, please inform me in this thread.

The second rule is still in force since teleporting from the Overworld to the Nether when no one is logged into the Overworld is always going to be problematic since the Overworld will get unloaded, better to just not teleport at all. This is the reason behind the parenthetical in rule 1 as well because as soon as players are logged off of the server, the world/trap containing chunks are unloaded and that is when the redstone bug appears. The plugin that Brad installed does seem to be working to support the changes to the redstone I have made -- in particular, unless the trap is running you should be able to safely use /back or /tp when near it, which was not the case before. In any event, I have not seen any issues since both the changes and the plugin were added.

I have cleared the lines of the drops to the collection area to make sure there were no unwanted drops remaining from prior bugs. So if you desperately need a double chest full of bonemeal, it might take a while, but once the trap has had a few weeks of collection, you should find the same convenience you had before.

And drew: at some point after I complete the list of things to do I have at hand, I will diagram the entire trap process, unless 709 gets to it before me.
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Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2014-03-10, 19:43

Quote:
Originally Posted by billybobsky View Post
And drew: at some point after I complete the list of things to do I have at hand, I will diagram the entire trap process, unless 709 gets to it before me.
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Bryson
Rocket Surgeon
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: The Canadark
 
2014-03-10, 19:44

OK, so teleporting is totally OK by the mob trap. Got it. Clear as day. Will do.

/back
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709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2014-03-10, 23:38

Quote:
Originally Posted by billybobsky View Post
I will diagram the entire trap process, unless 709 gets to it before me.
Short version: When mobs fall from a high place they die. Like most other things, they poop when they die. Bobsky has figured out a way to funnel mob poop to individual chests.

I can expand on this later if you want, but right now I'm drinking IPAs and listening to Tool. Loudly.

So it goes.
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2014-03-11, 00:02

I'm sorry, there were a few off-post references in Bruce's post.

I can see someone whose specialty is language will have to recompile this all into a simple rule!

Steve Jobs ate my cat's watermelon.
Captain Drew on Twitter
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709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2014-03-11, 00:10

Allow me: Things look good so far, though there are couple of things I need to look at.

I may have to reconfigure this and that, but it won't affect you plebs.

So it goes.
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2014-03-11, 00:48

You left out a reference to something above (something previously mentioned). What was that part?

Mention everything previously mentioned again, anytime you revise a go-by.

I forgets stuff

And you shutup, Dellphi, with all your lurking.

...

Steve Jobs ate my cat's watermelon.
Captain Drew on Twitter
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709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2014-03-11, 01:12

Oh right! The parenthetical Rule 1.

I thought that was a given.
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-03-11, 03:41

I might be repetitive but you know the rules now, dontcha?
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2014-03-11, 07:19

Bruce, please allow me to apologize for not being more precise in my request for better instructions.

Quote:
Originally Posted by billybobsky View Post
1) Enter and exit only through the Nether (and leave the trap if the server is about to restart), as described above.
I can't find the "as described above" part.

I even looked on the first page of the thread, but I'm becoming notoriously impatient in my middle age and incomplete or confusing instructions trigger my impatience filters.

Also, there's a visual guide that you made to entering the trap, but it's still confusingly written. As an example:

Quote:
2) You see a small stretch of hallway sealed by a 3x3 door with one trip wire in front of it -- this means someone is either at the trap or they did a bad bad thing
I don't understand. Why does this mean someone is already in the trap?
Bad thing? What bad thing did they do? I don't understand a lot of this description.

So I suppose what I'm asking for is a complete post that has all the data I need that doesn't reference prior posts and doesn't assume that I know why some things are happening.

This is the pedantic documentarian part of my personality that has prompted this post, and it's not meant to be aggressive in any way so please don't interpret it that way, it's just that my prior requests were not understood because they weren't explicit enough.

Thanks! And congrats on getting the trap working!



...

Steve Jobs ate my cat's watermelon.
Captain Drew on Twitter
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billybobsky
BANNED
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Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-03-11, 09:37

Drew what's going on with you?

I do not mean the rest of the post to be rude, so if it comes across that way please accept my apologies ahead of time. I don't want to have to spell out every little thing to do with the trap. Certain features of my statements are simply logical conclusions. The example you point out, for instance, is the logical requirement for how the trap is set up -- you cannot leave the trap via the Nether without the door opening and thus the door will only ever be closed if someone is there or they left via teleportation or dropping off of the trap. These last two things are bad, ie. they shouldn't happen because the downstream effects on the redstone could be significant. It really is that simple.

What I need to know is what is actually confusing to you. Have you gone to the trap? Is anything you encountered outside of my descriptions? If you are worried about breaking it, don't be -- if you simply travel through the Nether portal to and from, nothing should break.

I guess I simply don't get at what level I should be explaining these things. There are several redstone pieces of the trap. The mob pusher mechanic is simple and plenty of videos can be found describing it on the internets. The hoppers are the hoppers, not much really going on there. The array of item filters also has a great deal of video documentation on the web. There are features of my design of the filters that differ from common ones. For instance, at the end of each of the filters I have a drop burning device that will kill any excess drops that cannot be immediately shuffled into the chests below. I chose this design to prevent clogging of the hoppers with the most common and mostly unwanted drops.

In addition, my design is a redstone-only overflow prevention design in two ways: First, the filters only use the first slot of the hoppers to allow drops through (the remainder is filled with an inert material that mobs do not drop). This proves necessary in the situation where the storage and hopper lines after the filters get filled with drops and are then suddenly emptied (a common occurrence). What happens when using conventional filter design is that the filter hopper also gets filled, and the first slot gets emptied completely which kills the ability for the filter to continue to work. Second, the original design of the hopper filters had a significant chance of leaking over between filter lines since the redstone signal becomes shared between the comparators. It is a simple design, but this weakness also will cause the filters to stop being selective for the items they are designed to filter. My design is further unlike most out there in that I do not use pistons to prevent this shared signal from occurring. None of this will make sense to you if you do not try to build and understand the filters yourself.

Those elements are what went into the trap originally. That was what I expected to be sufficient for filtering and transporting the items. I learned a few things while building the trap: My original number of filters planned was too few (I had only wanted two sets) and backups were common. My hopper streams that combined into fewer numbers as they got closer to the chests was also somewhat limiting -- I have doubled the number going to each set of the most common drops, which should double the rate of drop delivery to the chests. The redstone issue was solved via several modifications built around the idea that if I knew when someone was at the trap I could allow drops to flow into the sorting systems, and when they weren't there I could protect the filters by not having anything actively flowing through them. I designed a simple shut off device for each of the hopper lines, and joined that to the 3x3 door. The design for the door is MumboJumbo's (his creations are some of the nicer ones I have seen on YouTube), the circuitry behind the door is obviously purpose built. I honestly didn't trust that people would remember to switch *off* the filters when leaving, so I use the door to know that they have left and to time their exit. Unfortunately, without some additional complexity, I cannot count the arrivals and departures (assumptions would have to be made with respect to people leaving together or arriving together, which further complicates things), hence the somewhat obtuse statement about knowing that there *should* be someone at the trap, while not knowing how many. Obviously in some cases the trap will be in an arrangement that I consider to mean no one is present, when someone is present. This was covered in my how to exit post. Basically, though, the circuitry is what you would need to allow this to occur -- the outer trip wire activates an open-if-closed circuit, and the inner trip wire is just a pure toggle (T-flip-flop) with a timer delay (active in the opening direction only). Both circuits have pulse limiters built in to prevent a user standing on the wire from causing problems. The design of these circuits is somewhat ad hoc, I built them on a test world and try to minimize them within reason while getting the timing down. It's like coding, except with a much more limited and geometrically confined programming language.

In any event, I suspect that this post will merely confuse you more. Perhaps this is best done live in the game. Unfortunately, I do not think our schedules overlap all that frequently..
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2014-03-11, 11:12

LOL

I don't know what's up with me, I really wasn't trying to aggravate you.

Your post has been VERY helpful to some degree, though you are correct in saying that I can't fully understand this all without having the experience of building elements of it on my own. I learned this when working with a hidden stair circuit several weeks ago.

My persistence in asking these questions was motivated by the fear of breaking something, which you've indicated is unfounded, and some confusion about how things like trip wires work.

I will need to go back and revisit the trap to experience all of this.

Steve Jobs ate my cat's watermelon.
Captain Drew on Twitter
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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2014-03-11, 13:21

So, a simple Star Trek reference where Bruce is Spock, and Drew is Bones.

Bruce: "Drew, the Redstone capacitor time-dilerium is afoul. And the monkey hopper is clogging the aft nacelle widgeter!"

Drew: "Damnit, Bruce, I'm a Grip, not a Mob-trap engineer!"

Bruce, raising a single eyebrow: "Drew, I am merely implying that the solution is simpler than it may first appear."

Drew: "Bruce, I'm not stepping into that thing until you can guarantee the safety of my particles!"



Funny stuff.



Following are the simplest set of instructions:

Drew: Go to trap; get stuff; leave trap; thank Bruce.

Bruce: If trap is broken, blame Drew.

See how easy that is?

- AppleNova is the best Mac-users forum on the internet. We are smart, educated, capable, and helpful. We are also loaded with smart-alecks! :)
- Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. (Mat 5:9)

Last edited by kscherer : 2014-03-11 at 14:02.
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drewprops
Space Pirate
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
 
2014-03-12, 08:43

Fifteen minutes later I'm still laughing...


...
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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2014-05-13, 23:40

Dear Mr. Bruce,

I did an oops! I /backed myself in and out of the mob trop about five times before realizing that I am a stupid nubbit! I am a bad, bad boy.

As a result of my actions, the powder chest is filling up with random crap. Drew is not at fault. It's all on me.


- AppleNova is the best Mac-users forum on the internet. We are smart, educated, capable, and helpful. We are also loaded with smart-alecks! :)
- Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. (Mat 5:9)
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
 
2014-05-14, 03:02

How soon they forget. I might find time to fix the trap before the weekend, but it isn't likely.

The trap is officially closed again, until further notice.
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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2014-05-14, 10:12

The man has spoken. Very sorry for the trouble.
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billybobsky
BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope.
 
Join Date: May 2004
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2014-05-16, 04:20

It's not likely I am going to get around to fixing this
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kscherer
Which way is up?
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Boyzeee
 
2014-05-19, 14:34

Mob Trap update:

With Bruce unavailable for the time being, I have taken it upon myself to have a look at the trap to see if I could fix it and BEHOLD!! she doth be working!

I had a look around and sorted out what was happening. When I was /backing (like a memory-deficient scum-ball) I was after just one item: Gunpowder. I would load up, type /back, unload, then type /back and return for more. This was me being lazy and stupid, nothing more.

Anyway, the powder chests began filling with random stuff, so I looked in the other chests and they were not suffering the same fate. It was then I realized I was /backing and had screwed up Bruce's work—again!

Turns out what is breaking are the hoppers leading into and out of the comparators.

The normal comparator situation looked like this:

Top hopper: 1 powder to the left, 1 bonemeal in each of the four spaces to the right.
Bottom hopper: 5 full stacks of powder.

I couldn't figure out why this normal configuration was causing problems until tracing the hopper "pipes" lead me to discover that there are actually FOUR collection/sorting areas within the trap. One of them was barked up with a comparator situation that looked like this:

Top hopper: all five bins occupied with random crap
Bottom hopper: random crap dropping through the bin on the left while the other four held nothing!

Thus, the comparator had nothing to "compare" and was letting everything through. Then, the bottom hopper emptied it's intended contents (gunpowder, which was normally always full, what with the vast volumes of powder coming through) and was simply passing random items to the chests one at a time as they fell into the system.

It was a VERY easy fix! So why was Bruce grumpy about it, you ask?

Well, I figured that out, too. Turns out, the very nature of Minecraft's redstone physics are to blame. With each redstone"block" or computer "block" occupying, well, one block, construction of redstone machines can sometimes leave little room for maintenance access. Thus, with gunpowder being at the front-most of the sorting mechanism, it is very easy to get to. However, all other sorts are buried behind the gunpowder pipes. This means each successive layer must be destroyed in order to even check the other pipes for errors, then rebuilt successively as you move back out.

In other words, it's a pain in the ass, and there are four collection/sorting mechanisms that must be checked individually to identify the problem. It's a big, giant pile of UGH!

All that said, my last oops has now lead directly to my having a [slightly] better understanding of the trap's collection and sorting mechanism. Although I still don't understand why the redstone breaks when you teleport in or out, I do now at least understand what is breaking! And, I know (mostly) how to fix it.

What breaks seems to depend entirely on what you are taking out. As I was only taking gunpowder, only the gunpowder lines got corrupted, since they were actively "moving". Items I was not taking out did not get FUBARed at all.

Two important notes:

1) Teleporting in and out of the trap does indeed break it. This includes /back and mod-priviledge teleporting.
2) Interestingly (and I say that while forgetting if Bruce ever mentioned it; he probably did) leaving the game (quitting) while at the trap has exactly the same effect.

I learned this just after I "fixed" the first mess I created and checked things over. Someone came into the store and I had to bail, so I quit (which is the habit I am in). I was very proud of myself and wanted to validate the fix, so, since Grey was in-game, I volunteered his time to come have a look. When we got there, the trap was broken, again, but no one had teleported. That's when it occurred to me that I had quit, leaving the redstone to trip all over itself.



So, the trap is open under the following three conditions:

1) No teleporting in or out!
2) If you are in the trap and need to quit, please leave the trap before doing so.
3) The Mob Trap portal is the only approved method for moving in and out of the trap area.

Bruce is a smart dude! I should have been paying better attention.

But, Bruce is gone for a bit, so that leaves us redstone-know-nothings to figure out how to keep things working until he returns. I will volunteer to check on things once in a while, but I will need help should the actual redstone itself go poop!

Anyway, have a day!

Edit: One more thing: The "gate" upon entering the Mob Trap is all kinds of barked up.

Edit 2: After further review, I did find maintenance access to the remaining pipes and comparators. I checked each and every one and found about 6 others that were good and buggered. I fixed them (I think) and the lines seem to be running smoothly. Drops are being sorted as per Bruce's design.

After finding the access areas, I am convinced that regular maintenance will be a 30-minute affair, at most. Again, I will keep an eye on it.

- AppleNova is the best Mac-users forum on the internet. We are smart, educated, capable, and helpful. We are also loaded with smart-alecks! :)
- Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. (Mat 5:9)

Last edited by kscherer : 2014-05-19 at 16:30.
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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2014-05-19, 18:25

Nice, thanks for taking on that and getting it going again. I'm sure everyone will appreciate it. We certainly do appreciate the work Bruce put into designing it and building it but he won't be returning to work on it again. You seem the best option now.

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
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