My Articles

To mark ten years of writing, I answered an overwhelming number of questions from readers I never expected to have.

Most discussions don’t touch on the places where CGNAT is an inescapable reality. For many users IPv4 scarcity still feels like a theoretical issue, and they design the internet accordingly.

Most services expect a user will have a phone number available, but many make the mistake of treating phone numbers as unique life-long identifiers. This is a customer experience and privacy nightmare.

Most JavaScript tooling is being rewritten in non-JS languages. Is this a sign that JavaScript is bad, or is it a sign that we’re finally taking it seriously and forcing it to mature?

When people ask for help with an issue on social media, it’s common to see responses implying it is a common issue. This can dissuades people from reporting problems.

We've been hard at work on WorldEdit 7.4. This release has mostly focused on internal changes and cleanups, but there are a fair few new features, which I'll go over in this post.

Last year I wrote an article about what I was going to keep an eye on in 2025 in the JS ecosystem. It was fun and introspective to write, so here’s the 2026 edition.

Another risk when it comes to modding is the community. They can facilitate feedback and help your mod grow, but they can also be a significant risk.

Something I’ve always loved about writing articles, is that it can start a conversation. Something that I felt was missing however, was the ability to find actual reply articles.

Modding is a labour of love for a game or project, however it comes with some risks that I don’t feel modding communities are very good at resolving or mitigating.

A common use for whole genome sequencing data is ancestry analysis. This article covers both online and offline ways to perform this analysis.

To help combat the effects of AI Search Engines on my blog, I have gone through the process to set up a mailing list. Here are my thoughts on the public offerings currently.

Motion sickness is an issue that affects up to one third of people. Is there a way we can strive to make gaming more accessible to people who suffer from the more severe forms of motion sickness?

AI chat bots are becoming ubiquitous in many areas of life, such as replacing online search engines. How does this affect blogging?

MCEdit no longer exists for new Minecraft versions, so how should you use schematic files now? We have the solution! Use MCEdit Schematic files in Minecraft 1.13 through 1.21, and newer.

I recently lost my Facebook account for two months, and was significantly cut off from certain aspects of society during that time. This is the dark side of account bans.

If you’ve spent much time in online gaming or IT related spaces, you’ve likely seen people refer to optimisation. What does this actually mean though?

Offline Mode is a feature of Minecraft servers that allows disabling user authentication. It does, however, come with security risks and less software support.

You have probably heard about shaders in Minecraft, but what actually are they, and is Java or Bedrock better for them?

There has been a fair amount of talk about how upcoming versions of Java will improve Minecraft. What's coming and how will it change things?

I self-published an eBook, and found it to be a complicated process compared to tooling for software engineers. This article goes over the process and my thoughts around it.

Spark is the most popular tool for identifying performance issues on a Minecraft server. It can be difficult to read if you don’t fully understand how it works.

As of today, Minecraft has had multiplayer for a decade. We have created a comprehensive history of the multiplayer community.

Running a Minecraft Server can be a daunting task. In this article you'll find answers to questions, guides for various systems, and advice on server administration.

Minecraft block lookups have gotten slower over time, but just how much slower have they actually gotten?

Server admins often ask what is the best version of Minecraft for their server to run. This article goes over everything you should consider when choosing.

When running a Minecraft server, having to choose between Forge or Fabric mods, or Bukkit plugin can be a difficult task. Hybrid servers can sound promising, but they do have some downsides that are important to be aware of.

JavaScript as a language is heavily asynchronous, with promises being deeply integrated. While this is sometimes the best solution, can the overhead of promises pose a problem for hot code?

2024 has been an interesting year for JavaScript. These are the projects I'll be watching, as well as the projects that I'm leaving behind.

Paper and Spigot are the two leading platforms for Minecraft servers. Which is better? This article goes over the main benefits of using both platforms

If you’re a Minecraft server admin, chances are you’ve heard the term “Bukkit” before. So, what exactly is it?

You may have heard rumblings in the community about a Paper 'hard fork'. This article covers what it is and what it means for Paper and the wider Minecraft server community.

When running a public Minecraft server, it's vital to understand the main security risks. Giving a server too much access to your machine can allow hackers or other malicious actors to do substantially more damage.

Now that you've got your whole genome sequencing data, what do you do with it? This article covers using a common tool known as WGS Extract.

A common question amongst Minecraft server administrators is whether WorldGuard, or a similar protection plugin, will work on modded platforms such as Forge, NeoForge or Fabric

My site has used Gatsby since 2019, but that framework is abandoned. I've moved to Vike, a framework built on top of Vite, and I'm loving it.

Fabric, Forge, and NeoForge are all massively popular modding platforms for Minecraft. So which one should you use?

Malware can be scary, annoying to remove, and extremely disruptive. It’s important to be aware of what it can look like and how to avoid getting it, as well as how to remove it.

If you don't have your Whole Genome Sequencing, picking a provider is a tough choice. This article covers some of the factors when considering options.

Should you run the --forceUpgrade flag when updating your Minecraft server? What are the pros and cons? And ultimately, should you use it?

Over the past year, numerous forks of Paper have popped up. The question, though, is should you use a fork of Paper over Paper itself?

CraftBook 5 has been in the works for a few years, and is now ready for general use. Betas are now available.

CraftBukkit is Minecraft server software that first started development well over a decade ago. But should you still be using it?

This release has been a very long time coming. WorldEdit 7.3 is full of many new features and underlying system reworks, which I'll go over in this post.

Knip is a great tool for identifying and cleaning up unused code, and you can make it even more powerful using their preprocessor feature.

If you run a Minecraft server, you might have come across cryptic errors such as “zip file closed” from various plugins, mods, or even the server itself.

The reload command in Bukkit is fundamentally broken and flawed, here's why, and what you should be doing instead.

Web bundlers such as Webpack are a great tool to deploy web apps, but for more complex programs, bundle size can quickly become an issue.

You've likely heard of plugin conflicts. But what are they? What issues can they cause? How common are they? How can they be resolved? This article answers all these questions and more!

VAC is known to have unforgiving lifetime bans for any cheating. A ban limits a few aspects of the Steam platform and prevents online play. These restrictions, however, are only a fraction of the punishment.

The Minecraft server community has many misconceptions floating around about using MySQL or other databases with plugins, some of which cause servers to perform significantly worse.

Accelerated Mobile Pages, or AMP, is a web technology championed by Google to improve the browsing experience on mobile devices. Throughout this article, I'll outline a few of the issues that led me to ditch AMP.

Recently, the topic of companies ending their covid-19 work from home allowances has been a talking point across the internet. To keep workplaces accessible, ALL employees who can feasibly work remotely should be allowed to work remotely.

NextJS is a framework that I've been using for a few years now. As a framework, I love it. In terms of deployment, though, I've never felt a NextJS site was 'stable'.

The Minecraft server plugin ecosystem has changed a lot over the years. This article is an always up to date list of the most useful recommended plugins to have on your Minecraft server.

I recently changed part of my name, and the experiences I've had with a vast majority of services has been kafkaesque. Tech companies should strive to make sure that this information should be user-modifiable.

Recently I had an experience involving the LastPass bug bounty program that didn’t end quite how I would’ve liked.

Exceptions are commonly used for flow control in Java, but how well do they perform compared to return values?

You may have heard mention of CraftBook 5. This post should give you all the information you need to understand what it is, why it exists, and what to expect.

It's been almost a year since the last big WorldEdit update. We're pleased to present WorldEdit 7.2, containing many new features, improvements, and bug fixes.

Timezones are confusing and unnecessary. While we likely won't get rid of them in the next few years, getting rid of them in the long term is beneficial and inevitable.

This article goes over embedding a Google Web Toolkit (GWT) application on a React website, and a few considerations that must be made when doing so.

There is a lot of controversy around large plugins being worse than multiple small plugins, but is it true?

Using WorldEdit with blocks added by mods on versions of Minecraft before 1.13 can be confusing, but there are a few ways to make it simple

Back in Minecraft 1.13, Mojang added a feature to Minecraft called Data Packs. These are becoming increasingly popular over time, but should you use them over plugins for your Minecraft server?

When browsing the internet or social media, you've likely seen some question marks or boxes where an emoji should be. What causes this, and how can you fix it?

JavaScript may not seem to be the ideal language to manipulate large amounts of data. This post goes over a few key problem areas and how you can avoid them.

I recently read Asana's blog post on TypeScript quirks and took particular interest in the first TypeScript quirk they mention. While it may seem like an inconsistency, the way the type system behaves here is entirely logical.

With over half a year since the last big WorldEdit update, we're now releasing WorldEdit 7.1, with many new features and improvements!

After over a year in the making, WorldEdit 7 is complete. This is a major update with hundreds of brand new features, find out more here!

Mob or entity stackers are a new craze in the Minecraft server administration space, with claims to massively improve performance. Is this true, though?

Premium plugins are incredibly popular amongst Minecraft servers today, but should you use them instead of free ones?

I watched Inland Empire last night. These are my thoughts and theories on the film.

2018 has been a busy year. It was the final year of my Bachelor's degree, the year of rewriting 3 of the most heavily used Minecraft mods, and also a year as President of Code Network, a large student-run programming society in South East Queensland.

Updating CraftBook to 1.13 has had a few issues, however it works properly now. A few major changes are also expected in the future.

Updating WorldGuard to 1.13 has been a complicated process, however not as time-consuming as WorldEdit.

Updating WorldEdit to Minecraft 1.13 has been a long and arduous process. Find out what's changed!

Minecraft server admins face unexplainable behaviour which they can't track down. Throughout this article, I'll outline some of the best ways to make it easy.

Quite often we get support requests from users where their server host is at fault. Find out common problems with server hosts, and how to solve them.

Over the past few months, I've taken on the task of updating WorldEdit, WorldGuard, and CraftBook to Minecraft 1.13.

A typical task that people want to achieve with WorldEdit is to load in a schematic, replace a few blocks, and then save it again. With WorldEditCLI, this couldn't be easier!

This article goes over the various development tools for Java development, each one's benefits, and my preference based on working with them.

There are two separate versions of Minecraft, Java Edition and Bedrock Edition. If you're thinking of starting a Minecraft server, this choice can be a daunting one.

Four years ago, I was hired by a game-server to create an advanced server-side aimbot detection system. This is what I learned.

In the new industry of VR, the physical characteristics of a person's body matter more than ever, and accessibility is paramount.

When talking with people regarding anti-cheat in games, a few common topics usually emerge. This is a summary of those common topics.

If you need help with open-source projects, there are a few things you can keep in mind so you can find a solution sooner, and help out the developers at the same time.

A step-by-step guide on how to work with schematics and clipboards in the WorldEdit 7 API.

Learn how to load and paste schematic files into Minecraft with WorldEdit, and even make your own to share with friends or the internet!

A common tool for finding lag on Minecraft servers moment is Timings. But there is more than meets the eye when it comes to Timings report, and they're not always able to tell you what is causing lag.

My journey over 8 years with the Minecraft community. From The Powder Toy, to CraftBook, AntiCheat, Sponge, and WorldEdit.