Tutorials/Custom texture packs

The purpose of this article is to teach you how to create a custom texture pack. It focuses on the extraction of files from the minecraft.jar and the putting of the edited files back into the game. For a list of modifiable files and completed community texture packs, go to: Texture Packs.

Windows
To extract the editable files for a texture pack, first download a compression program, such as WinZip or WinRAR, and make a folder on your desktop for texture pack storage. For Windows Vista/7, go to the "start" menu on your desktop and do a search for "%appdata%" (without quotation marks!). On Windows XP, go to "start" menu, click "run", and type in "%appdata%" (without (again) quotation marks!). There should be a file called roaming, Open it, and one of the folders inside should be called ".minecraft". Open this, and inside open the file titled "bin". Then go to the "minecraft" jar file and right click on it. in the menu of options should be either "7-zip" or "WinRAR". Follow the arrow from that option to the menu of actions, and choose "Extract to 'minecraft/'". (It is best that your folder for texture packs have the word minecraft in it. For example, mine is "minecraft-desktop"). Find the extracted files. They should have extracted to your desktop folder and be in a sub-folder titled "minecraft". Open this file, and there will be 961 .class files. Delete every one of these. Now you are ready to edit!

Mac OS
Extractions are considerably easier on the Mac, as the Mac comes with a program called Archive Utility. First, open Finder and go to Finder>Library>Application Support>minecraft>bin. Find minecraft.jar and right click (or control+left click). Click "Open With" and "Archive Utility". Archive Utility will create a new folder called "minecraft". Notice that this is a new folder, and that minecraft.jar is still intact. You can therefore modify and delete the new folder without altering your minecraft.jar. Create a new folder in your desktop, and drag all the necessary files into it (For a list of editable files go to: Texture Packs). Now you are ready to edit.

Windows
Once you have edited all the files to the desired look, you are ready to put them back as a custom texture pack. You're almost done! Select all the files (edited or not) Then choose the 7-zip or WinRAR option after right clicking and select "Add to archive...". The archive will open, and you can name the file. Then hit "OK", and the program will make all the files into a ZIP folder. To put into minecraft, simply start the launcher, log in, and at the tile screen go to the button "texture packs". In the lower left, click the Open Folder button and drag your ZIP into the folder. Select your texture pack, and view it on your computer.

Mac OS
Once you are finished editing, highlight all the files in your folder, right click, and click "compress (#) items". A new file called "Archive.zip" should appear. Rename the file to your liking. Go to Finder>Library>Application Support>minecraft>Texture Packs, and drag your .zip in. Now you can use your texture pack by selecting the button "mods and texture packs" in the main menu of minecraft, and clicking on your pack.