Minecraft after school club

[Theldron]

We are looking at possibly starting an after school club for Minecraft, by putting it on a seperate server and running it over the LAN so that the students can only play within school and cannot access any servers externally.

 

Is anyone else doing this?

 

I am looking at running the portable version of Minecraft, but whenever I try to run it in school and I keep getting an error:

 

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 2/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 3/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 4/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 5/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 6/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 7/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 8/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 9/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Downloading: https://s3.amazonaws.com/Minecraft.Download/launcher/launcher.pack.lzma (try 10/10)

Exception: java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

Unable to download remote file. Check your internet connection/proxy settings.

FATAL ERROR: net.minecraft.bootstrap.FatalBootstrapError: Unable to download while being forced

at net.minecraft.bootstrap.Bootstrap.execute(Bootstrap.java:83)

at net.minecraft.bootstrap.Bootstrap.main(Bootstrap.java:367)

 

 

Please fix the error and restart.

 

Any advice would be appreciated.

 

Thanks

Sean

[gavins38]

I'd say that website address that the minecraft launcher is trying to look for an update from, is being blocked by your firewall.

[bladedanny]

I get that. When going to the link in a web browser it works fine but the launcher (even with proxies set) doesn't work. I gave up in the end as it was only a few kids in a regular after school club.

 

I did presume it was a proxy/filter issue but never looked into it.

[gavins38]

Is it possible that Java's security is blocking that website. As I understand it the latest version of Java has meant that alot of Java applications no longer function unless you add a security exception to Java Config.

[bladedanny]

Is it possible that Java's security is blocking that website. As I understand it the latest version of Java has meant that alot of Java applications no longer function unless you add a security exception to Java Config.

 

Possibly, Although if it were that I'd have thought java at home wouldn't have liked it. Unless it's the filter java doesn't like, maybe thinks it's a middle man attack.

[gavins38]

I haven't really played around with the portable version of Minecraft but are you using the latest version? I used to play Minecraft some time back and my daughter wanted to have a go on it recently and I discovered that the old client can't auto-update or play the game at all. I had to download the latest client. I believe this change may have happened when Mojang aqcuired the game.

[bladedanny]

I haven't really played around with the portable version of Minecraft but are you using the latest version? I used to play Minecraft some time back and my daughter wanted to have a go on it recently and I discovered that the old client can't auto-update or play the game at all. I had to download the latest client. I believe this change may have happened when Mojang aqcuired the game.

 

Mojang have always made the game haven't they? But I have only seen this error with the new client.

[Jons]

Yes we had similar at our school, even if putting the proxy into Java settings in control panel (but it picks up IE settings anyhow).

 

Instead we purchased MinecraftEDU version and that installer worked fine.

[kennysarmy]

We are running Minecraft Edu here for lessons and after school.....

[pooley]

Not having played minecraft, what are the educational benefits of this game ?

[Chrish5]

And what's different about the Edu version?