Cloud



Clouds are an aspect of a world that appear over the top of the map; they have no practical service and are merely aesthetically pleasing. They do however, always float towards the west, making it fairly simple to get your bearings.

Appearance
Clouds will appear differently on different graphics settings, and have a set pattern. Their appearence (color, shape...) can be changed with a texture pack.

Fancy Graphics
On fancy graphics, clouds appear as about four block tall semi-transparent prisms. In the nighttime they turn a shade of blue and become more transparent. Their smallest horizontal dimensions are 12 x 12 blocks wide.

Fast Graphics
On fast graphics, clouds appear as opaque planes. They have no daytime/nighttime rotation. Their smallest horizontal dimensions are 8 x 8 blocks wide.

Pattern
Unlike many things in Minecraft, clouds are not procedurally generated. With a texture pack, clouds' color can be changed to anything, meaning you could have pink clouds if you so desired. The file can be resized to any size, meaning it would be possible to have a different cloud pattern each day.

History

 * Before the 1.8 update, clouds existed between layers 108 and 112, floating through anything in those layers and obscuring the player's view should he/she be inside them.
 * As of 1.9 Pre-release 5, clouds can be disabled in the video options.
 * Before 1.9 pre-release 4, clouds float to the north.
 * As of Minecraft 1.2.2, players can build much further above clouds, but grass won't grow above layer 128.
 * In Minecraft 1.2, clouds now cast a shadow below them, lowering the light level by 1. This allows for undead mobs, such as zombies and skeletons to survive under them.
 * In Minecraft 1.2, clouds now float the same direction of the sun and moon (East to West)

Future Plans
Notch said on reddit that he liked the idea of transforming clouds into blocks and making them collide with buildings, terrain, etc. On Get Satisfaction, a moderator of Mojang stated that Mojang said that "The current height regulation is just a temporary fix. Clouds will collide at some point, but not in the upcoming update." It is unknown when this feature will be implemented, though.

Trivia

 * If you switch between fast graphics and fancy graphics, clouds will be in a different place than they were before.
 * Clouds are a client-side feature. On a SMP server, the position of clouds is subjective to each individual user, and are not generated server-side.