Purugin

My kids are huge Minecraft fanatics. I set them up their own server with a whitelist, and now they have over 40 of their friends on it building incredible things. Not wanting to waste this opportunity, I'm using Purugin (https://github.com/enebo/Purugin) and helping them learn to write plugins in Ruby for their server. I'm writing a book with my son and daughter about the experience in hopes other parents out there can channel their kid's passion into learning a skill that will serve them the rest of their lives, no matter what occupation they choose. Minecraft has been a life changing event in our home. My kids would rather create than consume. That's something I can get behind as a parent.

My son (age 11) wants to be a game programmer because of his love for Minecraft. He talks about Notch as his hero. I've setup a Minecraft server running on a headless box in my house. The server has a whitelist of about 20 names with my children's friends from school so they can play. It's running Craftbukkit/Spigot (http://www.spigotmc.org/) and Purugin (https://github.com/enebo/Purugin) which allows me to help them write Minecraft plugins in Ruby. Minecraft has spread like wildfire at their little school in the country, and being able to have their very own server that they are able to program and invite their friends to play on has made them micro celebrities at their school. As a parent Minecraft is a way for me to engage with my kids on something we are all interested in. I am also teaching them programming on something they really c

Well there is an API, it's just an unofficial one, with very active developers : - http://bukkit.org/ - (well made ruby wrapper) https://github.com/enebo/Purugin Programming bots should be doable, I've seen plugins that spawned a player that helped you mining.