Getting Started

To set up CraftBoot for your modpack(s), first set up your client package and upload it to a web server somewhere. That link was made for SKCraft Launcher rather than for CraftBoot, but everything works pretty much exactly the same in CraftBoot. The only differences are as follows:

• Replace any use of SKCraftLauncher.jar in that documentation with the latest version of craftboot-launcher.jar.
• As of v4.2.4, CraftBoot Launcher optionally allows you to set a custom image icon for each modpack (to replace the default grass block). Put a "custom_icon.png" file in your source folder (i.e. the same folder where custom_jar.jar is stored) and it will be displayed next to that modpack's name in the launcher. The image can theoretically be any size, but it will be scaled down to 16x16.

Next, you need to make a launcher.properties file. This file should look something like this file. The packageListUrl variable is critical and should point to your package listing file, and I highly recommend you also set the newsUrl to the URL of a simple web page to appear in the launcher (if you don't want to make your own news page, you can use "http://oxguy3.github.io/craftboot-files/feed/welcome.html" as a generic replacement). There are several other variables you can set, listed here, but you probably do not need to mess with them at all (in particular, I highly recommend you do not set the version and selfUpdateUrl variables unless you know what you're doing). Once you have a launcher.properties file ready, upload it to your web server.

Now you just need to tell your players how to install the launcher. Upload the latest version of craftboot.jar to your web server and publish the link to your players. Give it a unique filename (i.e. if your modpack is AwesomeCraft, make it awesomecraft.jar), and make sure to tell your players not to rename it; CraftBoot uses that filename to distinguish your modpack from others. To start CraftBoot, simply double-click it. When it asks for a URL the first time you run it, tell your users to type in the URL of your launcher.properties file, like this:

Other than that, you should be golden! Simply follow the directions in the client package documentation to continually update your modpacks. To set up a server, use these instructions (note that you should again use craftboot-launcher.jar in place of SKCraftLauncher.jar). If you have any problems, questions, or concerns, please do not hesitate to create a new issue or send me a tweet.

For more documentation on the launcher itself, check out the rest of the documentation for SKCraft Launcher. Besides the addition of the bootstrapper and a few visual changes, the launcher distributed with CraftBoot is essentially a direct copy of that launcher, so most of the documentation still applies.