Mods

What is a mod?
Mods (short for modifications) are increasingly popular and are becoming very in-depth and add whole new experiences and goals to the game. Mods can now entirely change the minecraft you thought you knew.

Most mods in Minecraft add content to the game to alter gameplay, change the creative feel, or give a player more options in how they interact with the Minecraft world. Some may be bigger expansions, such as the Aether Mod, that add a significant amount of new content to the game. Other mods take away content to create a simpler or more more settings/options or optimizing the speed, graphics, or gameplay of the game. Server mods or plugins mainly give server admins more options and ease of use, and most mods for single-player have a server version that allows or optimizes the mod in multiplayer.

Ideally, the creator of a Minecraft Mod updates the mod whenever the game updates - bringing more content, bug fixes, or optimizations. Otherwise, the mod may not work with a new version. Many in the Minecraft community appreciate the additional experience and ease of use that come with mods, while others play "vanilla", the original game, with only the original content, and might view mod usage as cheating. While Minecraft mods are generally safe to install, one should exercise caution with mods to prevent crashes, deletion of game or save data, system instability, or potential malware infections from a bad link or the mod itself. A good way to protect your game from such problems is to back up various files such as the .minecraft, the saves folder ect; if you choose to use mods. There are many mods or plugins available to complement the original Minecraft game or give server admins more options and control over their servers.

Official Modding API: Plugins
The Modding API is an upcoming feature that allows modders to more easily add content to the game. Mojang have now revealed that the Bukkit team are making the Official Modding API. . Curse recently interviewed Jeb about the Mod API. Jeb has released that he wants Mods to be as easy as possible to find, install and download (i.e. without modifying the minecraft.jar). The API will NOT be exactly the same as Bukkit. Most mods will be multiplayer server compatible. Watch Part 1 of the interview here and Part 2 here.

Dinnerbone has revealed that content in the Modding API will be known as Plugins rather than Mods. Dinnerbone stated that Mojang did not want to name this content as Mods because actual Mods will still exist that modify game files, which would not be compatible. Plugins will be easy to install by simply dropping them into a folder.

How to install Mods
The above link provides a comprehensive guide on how to install mods. Nearly all mod packs have auto-installers that make adding mods to Minecraft extremely easy for the beginner Modder. VCNG

Outdated Mods
All outdated mods from 1.0.0 and later can be found from the above link.

Only move mods on this page to the Outdated Mods Page when a full month has passed since the version release. Some modders take longer to update their mods than others. Once substantial time (at least a month, if not more) has passed since the version release, only mods that are two versions earlier should be kept. E.g. If one month has passed since 1.2.3 has been released, only mods that are for 1.0.0 and 1.1 should be kept on the Outdated Mods page. Any mods in Beta 1.8.1 or earlier are unlikely to get updated, and are considered dead mods. These mods can be deleted from the list.

Modding Programs and Editors
The above link gives showcases tools for installing and making mods

Client Mods
''' TIP: Use CTRL+F (Windows) or CMD+F (Mac) to find a mod you are looking for. ''' Client mods are modifications to your Minecraft program. They are not custom clients, and they require modification of minecraft.jar. Like high resolution textures, they only work with the launchers, and won't work if you play through a browser.

The most common form of client mods are aesthetic and/or functional (such as the iMod). However, some client mods add new content to the game, and others fix issues with the game.

As the Minecraft server software will ignore custom content from client side, most of the client mods which add new content to the game do not work in SMP unless a modification has also been installed on the server. Some authors of client mods have made server versions of their mods available, and others have not. A few of the Loader/API type client mods (e.g. ModLoader and AudioMod) and many of the functional client mods (e.g. OptiFine, Rei's Minimap and TooManyItems) have effect in SMP straight away, without any modification on server side.

Adding/Editing Client Mods
When adding a new mod to the list, first please check that the mod is not already listed in one of the sections on the page.

Second, please put the mod in the correct section. If it adds new mobs, items, blocks or dimensions, put it in New Content. If it changes features of an existing item or adds settings, like adding a new difficulty level or making mobs drop more experience, put it in Aesthetic and Functional Mods. If it fixes a bug in "vanilla" Minecraft, put it in Fixes.

Third, please keep the mods in alphabetical order. It's much harder to find older, established mods when they are buried beneath the mods that have been thrown on top of them.

Fourth, Do not place unreleased mods, especially if they have a message in the download link such as "This mod will be released soon". Also, '''Do not place download links. It only adds to the frustration of potential spam, plus, if there are no pictures, people are less likely to download the mod.

Thank you for following these simple rules.

Note: The guide below works for New Content and Aesthetic and Functional Mods.

Before adding mods, you must understand the code used. For this example, we will use Single Player Commands.


 * Single Player Commands
 * style="text-align: left;" |Single Player Commands is a mod that adds commands to your single player worlds.
 * 3.2.1
 * Forum
 * simo_415
 * simo_415
 * simo_415

Lets look at the first line. is the name of the mod.

The 2nd line is a little bit more complex. tells the wiki to align the text to the left of the column, rather than in the middle. The next part of the line,, is a brief description of the mod. Don't make this too long, perhaps copy and paste the first few lines of the description of the mod.

is the latest version number. Usually this is in the thread header or in the body of the thread. If the version is not specified, use the latest release version as the version number (e.g. if the mod is compatible latest version of Minecraft (1.2.4) and the thread doesn't specify the version, use 1.2.4 in place of the version number).

is the website address of the mod. At the end of the web address, type space and then type Forum/Website/Planet Minecraft/Wiki (depending on what you are linking to). This is what is displayed in the table. Make sure you include the whole website address and also the brackets - they tell the wiki that the link is clickable.

is the latest Compatible version, The first  is whether ModLoader is required or not,   is the Mod creator/author and the last   is whether the mods is SMP compatible.

If you are updating a mod, all you have to edit is the website address and the version number.

'''Tip: If this guide is still confusing, copy and paste a mod's code and edit it accordingly.

APIs and Loaders

 * For a list of Outdated APIs/Loaders, see here.

Fixes

 * For a list of Outdated Fixes, see here.

If it a mod fixes a bug in "vanilla" Minecraft, put it here.

Aesthetic and Functional

 * For a list of Outdated Aesthetic and Functional mods, see here.

If a mod changes features of an existing item or adds settings, like adding a new difficulty level or making mobs drop more experience, place it here.

New Content
For a list of Outdated New Content mods, see here.

If a mod adds new blocks, items, mobs or dimensions, place it here.

Server Mods
Server Mods are modifications to the official Minecraft server software.

Server mods are commonly designed to make administration of servers easier by implementing tiered privileges for commands (such as kicking, banning etc.). They are frequently implemented as "wrappers" which do not actually modify the main server .jar file, instead monitoring its output and sending commands to it.

For a list out of date Server Mods, see here.

Videos

 * How to install ALL mods with links to all resources
 * How rsmalec installs/upgrades his mods