TrueNAS + MineOS = Minecraft 1.18.1 Server Goodness

Here is a quick and easy guide I thought I would put together for anyone who wants a quick and easy Minecraft sever and you already have a TrueNAS box in the cupboard -

A few prerequisites -

• A TrueNAS system with a good amount of RAM, TrueNAS already likes RAM so if you’re running one on a budget this might push your system beyond its capacity (I am running version 12.0-U8)
• Some free space to install it on, It takes less than 1Gb to get up and running but I would put a few Gb aside as your world gets bigger
• Minecraft Java edition (I have noticed there is a lot of confusion from beginners about MC versions, and the difference between a server and a client)
• An understanding of how to make shares and change user permissions will help, and maybe make you perfect my process

Install the plugin -
1. Log into your TrueNAS box and head to the plugins section, change the selections to the community collection and look for the MineOS plugin
2. Click Install plugin
3. Click Advance options
4. Give the plugin a name, I went with ‘mineos’ to keep things simple
5. Disable NAT
6. Enable Berkeley Packet Filter
7. Assign IPv4 Interface to ‘vnet0’
8. Give your server an IP, try to assign something outside of your DHCP range
9. Hit SAVE

Install Java 17 -
This is the key to running the latest MC version, 1.18.1
1. Click on ‘Shell’ in TrueNAS, it’s at the bottom of the items on the left
2. Run the following commands in this order -

iocage stop mineos
iocage upgrade mineos
iocage start mineos
iocage exec mineos bash
pkg install openjdk17

If all goes well, following a restart (iocage stop mineos, iocage start mineos) of the plugin you should be able to log into the server using user name and password ‘mcserver’ for both.

Install profile -
Once in the server, on the left hand menu click on the profiles section and download 1.18.1 from the Mojang repo.
You can change the repository and install Paper, Spigot, Waterfall and many others if that is your cup of tea.

Create the server -
On the left hand menu, click create a server, give it a name and save it. You can change any of the other options as desired. I do recommend changing the port from the default 25565 to something else. This will allow other MC servers to run on your network with out incident. (Ask me how I know)

Start The Server -
Click the dashboard on the left hand menu, find you server at the bottom of the page and click it.
Change the profile to your chosen MC build and the Java .jar allocation too.
I would increase the RAM to 1024 or more, depending how much you have in the system. Click Start… The server will try to start before asking you to accept the EULA. Once this is done, start the server again and BOOM! We’re done.

You should now be able to log into the server from you Minecraft game install via the multiplayer menu.

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Trying to install this on 3/15/22.
Fresh new install of TrueNas 12.0-u8.

When trying to install the mineOS plugin, I get the following error.

Error: mineos had a failure Exception: RuntimeError Message: Last 10 lines: fatal: remote error: The unauthenticated git protocol on port 9418 is no longer supported. Please see LINK REMOVED for more information. Partial plugin destroyed

I am guessing the plugin must be broken at the moment? That a line in what it is trying to get from Github, is no longer good anymore?

I have just tried to re-run the install with the same error. Looks like the Git is broken for now. I am sure it will be fixed soon though!

Hi, I have just tried to install the same via the outline addressed above to TrueNas Core 12 (7/16/22) and get the same error… is there a workaround for this or do we wait.

Dang, I was hoping there would be by now as it has been broken for a while.

I am about to embark on some major server maintenance so I will be going though the setup process again soon, I’ll post my findings here for everyone to enjoy!

(Welcome to L1T btw :slight_smile:
)

damn, I’ve been procrastinating this minecraft server thing for like, 2 years now and just when I get to it I get that same error :sweat_smile:

I tore my truenas down last night so ill be working on this in the next few days. Standby y’all!

Hi y’all,

Quick update - I have just reinstalled MineOS on my TrueNAS system (TrueNAS-13.0-U1.1).

Besides making sure the jail name is unique the plugin installed with no issues. I have not setup a server yet but the plugin seems to install fine.

How did y’all go? Did everyone resolve their install issues?

END NOTE - I have set up the server as per my instructions above and it seems to be running well. This time I have installed the paper version of 1.19.2

I will update if I have any issues but this seems to be solid!

Hello i want to know how i can use mineOs to play with my friends in the world can you help me please? thanks

Hey Buddie, welcome to the forum.

Short answer is yes. The whole point of a server based MineCraft setup is so that anyone can log in at any time.

That said, you should be very careful if you plan on letting your friends access your network over the internet.

If you plan on just hosting the server locally and letting your friends come to your house to log in then it is pretty striaght forward. Once the server is setup, you can all log in the same way - by adding a multiplayer server from within the minecraft game menu.

Sorry for the late reply, I hope this helps.

Feel free to reach out if you have any more questions.

PAWS :slight_smile:

Hey paws

i’ve been trying to follow you installation guide for MineOS, managed to self troubleshoot some little snags along the way.
First time using TrueNAS so i’m very green on how to use it.
I’m up to the ‘Shell’ commands step and ‘iocage exec mineos bash’
is failing (i think)

root@******* [~] # iocage exec mineos bash
/bin/sh: bash: not found
Command: /bin/sh -c bash failed!

How do i proceed from here?

Thanks in advance for your help.

He’s running TrueNAS Core. You’re probably using TrueNAS Scale. So this doesn’t work as there are no iocages in KVM/QEMU and Linux doesn’t use pkg for package management either.
Both use zsh as far as I’m aware. Not sure why there is no bash on Scale, but doesn’t surprise me. CLI on Scale is not officially supported yet.

Isn’t there some MineOS in Truecharts catalog? That why people usually pick Scale over Core.

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Thanks @Exard3k for replying to this. It seems I missed in my notifications.

In response to the question - If you are running a different version of Truenas that will most likely cause you issues.

The guide SHOULD work if you make sure you do each step in order. I have used the guide myself to set the server up a couple of times and it worked as advertised.

But Truenas can be confusing to a first time user so I would recommend setting up some other plugins like PLEX that are a bit easier to get going to get used to the UI and all of its quirks. It is also a good idea to learn how the Minecraft servers run on their own, like on a bare-metal ubuntu server. That way if something doesn’t work for you it will be much easier troubleshooting it. (Ask me how I know)

Hopefully you have gotten it up and running! Let US/me know if you have any more issues or if version was the problem. :wink:

Hi Guy’s just followed this process without the shell (using scale and not core). The server will start, then immediately shut down.

Running TrueNas Scale TrueNAS-SCALE-23.10.1.3
64GB Ram
intel i7-11700K

MineCraft-OS - Chart Version: 1.0.20 (community app)
Allocated 1024 MB RAM
Jar 1.18.1 and 1.20.4

Server will start - then drops out immediately. Cannot even connect to it. Any tips

WOW - What a beast of a system!!!First thing I would try is allocating 4Gb or more ofRAM to the system(you can spare it, you know you can!) If that doesn’t work, there is some GREAT news for you, because you chose to use scale instead of core you don’t have to try and use a plugin at all (the plugins in core are basically garbage at this point. They were okay but compared to what else if out there now, they are garbage)

I have personally got pretty limited experience with TrueNAS scale, I have only set it up on a test system for a play around, never used it in production. That said. I believe it has a decent enough VM ‘backbone’ as it were to handle running a simple ubuntu server virtual machine which can then run a SOLID minecraft server.

To get you started downlod the ubuntu server ISO from here

Set it up as a VM in your TrueNAS scale system. Once you have it installed run the following commands:

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y

sudo apt install openjdk-19-jre-headless -y

wget https://piston-data.mojang.com/v1/objects/8dd1a28015f51b1803213892b50b7b4fc76e594d/server.jar

 java -Xmx1024M -Xms1024M -jar server.jar nogui

sudo nano eula.txt
(change the false to true)
sudo nano server.properties

(edit the server properties, setting port and world name etc as you wish. You can skip this step ifyou are unsure)

java -Xmx1024M -Xms1024M -jar server.jar nogui

If you run into any issues setting up the VM or setting up the server feel free to reach out and I will try and help out as much as I can.

I have just followed the above instructions and setup a working MC server in a ubuntu server VM. To connect to the server you add a new server in the multiplayer section of minecraft using your VMs ip address followed by :25565 (example - 192.168.1.0:25565)

One more thing, I gave my server 4Gb of RAM and 2 CPU cores. Ber generous in your VM spoecs, you can always dial it back later if youhave over done it.

One more thing - to keep the server running even if you close the terminal it is always good to run the server in a ‘screen session’. to do this simply run the command

screen -s minecraft_server

Good luck!

PAWS

@rjtyler

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Hey bud, thanks for maintaining the thread!

And this project as a whole (as well as others)

Is the server still running, and still in use?

How’s it for updates / upgrades of the software, or has it #JustWorked :tm: in the background?

Or by now, people moved on with lives / school / whatever?

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Just doing my bit for the L1T :wink:

The TrueNAS server I originally had it setup on is still running but just as a NAS. I have moved away from plugins in TreuNAS core (besides PLEX, which still works fine) as they seem to be getting forgotten about with development. It seems that TrueNAS scale is the way to go moving forward in regards to plugins and VMs. But CORE is a a very solid option for NAS only needs.

I have moved my minecraft server to a proxmox cluster running under ubuntu server using a simular process descibed above to set it all up. I have to say, having had the chance to play around with proxmox for a while now, it really is a great choice for VMs. If you can get a backup server running as well (can be run as a VM on truenas scale) you have a really SWEET home lab solution. I have been using a bunch of HP elitedesk minis as a proxmox 2 node cluster with a 3rd machine acting as a backup server, I also have home assistant with a coral TPU USB stick as my home assistant server. What a world we live in where I can get thses machines for $150AUD each. =D

Thanks for the follow up. see ya around.

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