Have you ever needed to have a script check whether a Minecraft server was online, or retrieve its listing information, like the “Message of the Day” (server description) or the number of active players? Maybe you run your own server, and want to display the status on a community website. Or perhaps you have something more ambitious in mind.
After reading up on the protocol Minecraft uses for the in-game listing of your favorite servers, I put together a simple PHP class that makes it easy. Here’s a fancy demo that makes use of it.
The library, which you can download on GitHub, along with the aforementioned demo page, looks like this:
<?php
class MCServerStatus {
public $server;
public $online, $motd, $online_players, $max_players;
public $error = "OK";
function __construct($url, $port = '25565') {
$this->server = array(
"url" => $url,
"port" => $port
);
if ( $sock = @stream_socket_client('tcp://'.$url.':'.$port, $errno, $errstr, 1) ) {
$this->online = true;
fwrite($sock, "\xfe");
$h = fread($sock, 2048);
$h = str_replace("\x00", '', $h);
$h = substr($h, 2);
$data = explode("\xa7", $h);
unset($h);
fclose($sock);
if (sizeof($data) == 3) {
$this->motd = $data[0];
$this->online_players = (int) $data[1];
$this->max_players = (int) $data[2];
}
else {
$this->error = "Cannot retrieve server info.";
}
}
else {
$this->online = false;
$this->error = "Cannot connect to server.";
}
}
}
There are some code snippets strewn around the internet that do essentially the same thing, but without the handy wrapper class.
To query a server, you instantiate the class and pass it the IP or domain name of the server, as well as the port if it is not the default Minecraft port of 25565. (Do not include “http://” or any slashes. Just the hostname or IP.)
include "MCServerStatus.php";
$server = new MCServerStatus("s.nerd.nu", 25565); //The second argument is optional in this case
Once you have created a new instance of the object, you can use the information that it gathered.
$var = $server->online; //$server->online returns true if the server is online, and false otherwise echo $server->motd; //Outputs the Message of the Day echo $server->online_players; //Outputs the number of players online echo $server->max_players; //Outputs the maximum number of players the server allows print_r($server); //Shows an overview of the object and its contents. (For debugging.)
Now go and play some Minecraft!
Update: MCServerStatus is now on Github. Fork away!
Update 2012/11/12: The version of the library available on GitHub has been updated to work with the new protocol in Minecraft 1.4.
Thank you SO much for this easy to use interface. I had been searching for something SIMPLE so that a beginner like me could actually use it. This was exactly what I was looking for. Thank you for the great work.
Hello guys. I have a problem where when I put the file online it doesn’t display the server online. When I use wamp on my computer it works, but when I use my web host it doesn’t.
Site: http://hg-mc.co.cc/demo/
I have hosting with Hostgator, business plan.
Can anyone please help. Can it be a problem with the PHP? Maybe the function is not supported. Can you help me out please.
The server I am trying to connect is 24/7 on a dedicated server. Again it does work on wamp but not on my host.
Maybe your host has disabled the stream_socket_client() function?
Your host might also have blocked the port (that’s what mine did. I contacted them and they allowed the port through)
Any way to sort that the list by status? Like if I wanted all the online servers to be at the top, then sort it by amount of players? I was looking at the option in PHP called “usort()” but I didn’t want to get ahead of myself.. maybe you might know a better way..
Thanks in advance,
-Sean
You’re on the right track. The easiest way to do it would probably be to have the foreach loop store the info it collects about each server in an array. Then use usort() on that before creating a new foreach loop to output the contents of the array.
Can it be modified to get the list of players/plugins etc aswell? Appreciate the help! this is the first class that’s worked for me so far!
hey man, nice project, but it doesn’t work for me. Max players are stuck on 0/0 and motd message doesnt work. Can you help me? Can you make a tutorial video? Thx
Hey Darione, I also had this same problem when setting up the script on my server tonight. I was able to fix it by following steps previously mentioned by Stella, which involves contacting your web hosting provider and having them open up/allow access to the minecraft server port. If your hosted with HostGator just contact them with live chat and they’ll have it working in minutes.
Hey Matt!
Love your work, helped me out alot!
I was just wondering if there is any way to return the ping timer in milliseconds?
I’m currently working on a project where i want to put the ping time in a database so i can create a procente of how much the server is online.
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
ps. I know I could do it with the online variable as well but i’m making a grid in javaScript to show the ping at a certain point in time.
Thanks in advance!
Hey Matt, Phoenix here again.
I was wonder if you could do a guide how to update this code?
It seems bukkit change some protocole(as i’ve understood it) and the code no longer works.
If you could go into how to do it yourself so we could find it ourselves for upcoming versions of bukkit, would be really helpful.
Thank you in advance!
Phoenix.
hiiii
good project thanks for this post
Hello,
I added same script on my site but online members are not showing also not showing online/offline.
My server is linux base can i know hot to fix this issue please check below link for it.
http://serverofminecraft.com/server/demo/
Minecraft port 25565 is not working.
Waiting for your reply
Thank you
Mojang changed the protocol in 1.4. I’m going to update it soon, once I get around to it.
Nice work man, This is exactly what I’m after. Just curious however, can anybody confirm/deny that this script works with Bukkit servers? or does it have to be vanilla?
This should work for both.
I’ve modified the script myself a bit but it does work for bukkit.
It definitely works with Bukkit servers. I tested it with the ones I play on, and they use Bukkit. (They try to keep it reasonably vanilla, but they have to have a bunch of moderator plugins to keep the peace.)
Hey,
Great work, I haven’t implemented yet but it sounds perfect. I am curious though… the files I downloaded from GitHub look nothing like the implementation described above. I’m not good at writing PHP but I can work around it, unfortunately the demo seems really really cryptic and overly complicated. Would it work if I just copied and pasted your script above and implemented as you described? If not could you update your instructions?
Thanks
The version on GitHub is much newer, and has had a few contributions from other users. It’s built more for the style of code encouraged by the PSR-0 guidelines, and requires a minimum of PHP 5.3. It’s less simple, but it plays nicer with modern conventions and frameworks.
The last I checked, the simpler script above still worked for me. The protocol in Minecraft changed in the last update, but the script was still working at the time, so I assume there’s some backwards compatibility. (I might update the script here in the future to use the changes, when I get around to it, for the sake of the future. It seems to work, though.)
I was wondering, could you make a version that has a HTML for that submits the data?
I am getting this error any help? “Warning: stream_socket_client(): unable to connect to tcp://stormforgemc.com:25565 (Connection refused)”
Thanks very much!
Can I somehow request the list of the online players?
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I’m curious whether do we need a VPS to set up this, pls tell me if anyone know?
You shouldn’t need one, so long as your host doesn’t disable remote socket connections.
Can you please take a look at these that’s why it’s not working
http://serverofminecraft.com/demo/demo/
http://serverofminecraft.com/server/demo/
Please help I’m desperately trying to get this to work. Looking forward for your reply soon.
http://serverofminecraft.com/demo/demo/
Please check this one and Please suggest what can i do for this error ?
Warning: stream_socket_client() [function.stream-socket-client]: unable to connect to tcp://s.nerd.nu:0 (Connection timed out) in /home/serverof/public_html/demo/MCServerStatus/Minecraft/Stats.php on line 10
Waiting for your reply
Your web host is probably blocking the port Minecraft uses in their firewall.
Is this supported with the 1.5 update? The current version is 1.5.2 right now.
The version on GitHub should still be supported, as the protocol hasn’t changed since 1.4, though I haven’t tested the one in the post in awhile.
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