Talk: Technical blocks

Redundant information everywhere

So most of theses blocks are far better explained their own article. I know this has been mentioned before, but this page is getting ridiculous. And it is inconsistent, for example, it has the Brewing Stand and the Cauldron, but not the repeater and the comparator (the unpowered versions). The worst part is people are often adding information to this article, when they should be adding it to the actual articles on the blocks. In summary I think an official definition of a technical block is needed, or to break apart this article completely.

Sorry about a bit of a rant, but I am finding this page very hard to use in it's current form.

--KnightMiner ^{(talk|contribs)} 00:26, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Now that most of them seem to have been removed as of 1.8/1.7.2, what still remains?? –Goandgoo ᐸ Talk
Contribs
Edits 10:58, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

Burning furnaces and farmland are all I can find. Mostly though, this article is about the block forms, and tons of fake technical blocks that should get removed, as they are simply the block form of an item (if we keep that up, we will need to add just about every block come 1.8 - 1.9, as blocks and items have been mostly separated with the addition of blockstates). --KnightMiner ^(t|c) 21:23, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

I was wondering myself why there were so many 'technical blocks' listed in this article. I agree having a definition that singles out exceptional blocks would be nice.

I had expected to find only blocks that have no item that places them, like piston head, piston extension, nether portal and end portal.

Interpreted widely, perhaps also blocks that can't be placed directly, but that transform from a default block, such as lit furnace, lit redstone ore, unlit redstone torch, powered redstone repeater, lit redstone lamp, powered redstone comparator, inverted daylight sensor or farmland.

In no sense did I expect things like flower pot, bed, mob head, sign, brewing stand, cauldron, wooden or iron door, redstone wire, stationary or flowing water or lava, wheat, potatoes, carrots, pumpkin or melon stems, sugar cane, nether wart, cake or monster spawners.

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 05:46, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

I am now starting to think that we could just incorporate these parts into their respective articles, and do away with this page. The definition of a Technical Block currently on this page is based on a now-outdated concept; Goandgoo is right, you can't "obtain" these blocks anymore, they are now cleanly tucked away and restricted so that they can only be used properly (except Farmland, which has its own article anyway). Everything in this article is really just variations on the default block you would get if you placed the item, and are covered in the Block State sections of their respective articles -- except spawner and piston related blocks, which still could be covered appropriately in their own articles.

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 06:15, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

I also agree splitting this article would be a good idea. Most of this information can cleanly fit on an existing article, such as the variety of piston related blocks or the duplicate repeater, stem, and door blocks. It also seems like in the future it will be harder to tell what fits the current definition, so splitting would make even more sense. I am going to add a split message box to the article linking to this discussion. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 14:57, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

Still advocating to split it, but if so, want to bring up a few things.

1. Is it worth keeping a short summary of what Technical Blocks were, as historical info?
2. If so, perhaps they warrant a full list of what blocks were in the list, through 1.7.x (before block states)? Just a list, and an explanation of why they were considered Technical Blocks, but aren't considered that anymore.
3. Are the PE / Console blocks here still true Technical Blocks, under the definition?

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 15:38, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

 Support. I’ll propose this change on Russian wiki. — NickTheRed37 ^t/_c (f.k.a. Naista2002) 16:01, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

@Sealbudsman: To answer 1 and 2, maybe we could replace it with a category? It could have a brief description and a relevant list. As for the PE/Console edition, the blocks from the list seem to fit the same cases of PC edition, some would be decent to state here, while some don't belong. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 16:08, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

The very meaning of “technical block” is too broad and unofficial. I don’t see any need in having this term at all (along with the article), to the point that I tagged the Russian article for deletion. — NickTheRed37 ^t/_c (f.k.a. Naista2002) 16:29, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

agree. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 23:28, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

Seems like the only stuff we'd have to move into other articles are the pumpkin and melon stem stuff, the portal stuff, the pocket edition stuff and the removed stuff. Then this article would be 100% redundant. I'll put it on my to-do list. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 23:28, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

And what if farmland was removed? Then it would get even worse. I suggest outlining the term without highlighting each block. Most of these blocks already have articles. 108.216.29.126 18:43, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Then we describe it on Farmland? No complications there. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 18:47, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

 Support. With recent updates this page has pretty much become obsolete. I notice a lot of these "technical blocks" are simply blockstates (like the Beetroot crop), event-triggered blocks (like Glowing Obsidian or Nether Portal), or removed features altogether (like infinite water/lava source). At this point I think it's safe to say we can begin to merge most (if not all) of these technical blocks into their respective parent block articles. I'd be willing to help any way I could. And I think eventually this cumbersome page should be flagged for deletion. Superspace (talk) 22:40, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

I think we're at a point now, where everything here is truly redundant (thanks, Superspace for picking this back up and running with it). If that's the case, I think our to-do list is now:

1. Go through everything linking here, and re-link elsewhere. I don't know if that's easier with a bot, or what, considering the amount of anchors involved.
2. Say goodbye to this page.

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^T/_C 19:34, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

At this point, the only thing pointing to this page (besides user, talk and issue pages) are:

1. (Using a usage/definition that we never did totally agree upon):
   1. Sand/BE (transcluded into the sand, gravel, dragon egg, anvil and Chunk format articles), and Tutorials/Falling sand, mentioning whether the fallingsand drops an item,
   2. Template:Blocks/content (or [[Template:Blocks/content/he|/he]] translation, and everything that transcludes them), as a row header,
   3. 13w37a, 1.7.2, 1.8 as part of block lists,
   4. Glowing Obsidian, in the lede,
2. [[:File:Pumpkinstems.png]] and [[:File:Melonstems.png]] which aren't linked anywhere (they showcase bugs)
3. Blocks (and [[Blocks/tr|/tr]], [[Blocks/se|/se]] and [[Blocks/fa|/fa]] translations), as a See-Also link,

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^T/_C 19:25, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Now that all of the main links are gone, I think it's probably best just to redirect this page to Blocks, rather than delete it entirely. –Goandgoo ᐸ Talk
Contribs 22:54, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

That might be a good idea, as long as we also add a brief section on it so the redirect to makes sense. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 01:22, 19 August 2015 (UTC)

Ok, I've created a brief section on the blocks page. Before I create the redirect, is there any need to salvage some or any part of the history section? –Goandgoo ᐸ Talk
Contribs 01:26, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

Removing "Stackable" from infoboxes

The "Stackable" entry in infoboxes is useless, since these blocks cannot be obtained ^{(exceptions: Spawners, Burning Furnaces and Farmland)}, I vote for removing it. Laura Fidalgo ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 15:01, 20 October 2014 (UTC)

You would need to edit a template, which messes up other pages, but you could do one of the following:

• Create a new template for technical blocks
• Put NA or something similar for stackable

71.35.109.25 03:32, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Technical blocks already have their own template. Every row is optional, including stackable. –KnightMiner ^(t·c) 05:33, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Then yes, remove stackable from all the blocks that do not appear in pocket edition. You can follow the link in this response to make sure.71.35.109.25 15:16, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Portal in the end

The nether portal section says that the coordinates of the nether side of a portal in the end depends on the coordinates of a the end portal you used to get to the end. What would happen if you came in from the nether?71.35.109.25 03:24, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
I forgot to say that I play pocket edition.71.35.109.25 15:37, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Actually, I checked the page and it says when you first entered the end, but what if you build an end portal in the nether in creative mode?71.35.109.25 04:05, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

The end portal from any dimension except the end will send you to the obsidian platform in the end. Nether portals have no effect on this behavior. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 15:25, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

I mean if you entered the nether from the end and you came to the end from a portal in the nether.67.160.25.176 23:51, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

End portals function identically in the nether to one in the overworld, send you to the exact same spot. Nether portals can bring you from the end to the nether, though there are a few issues.

In both cases, you cannot obtain the block in that location without commands. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 04:14, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Do you mean you would get a portal in the over world?71.35.109.25 14:41, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

As stated in the article end portal, three frames naturally generate in the overworld, only needing to be activated using eyes of ender to add the portal.

End portals do not generate naturally in the nether, due to the lack of frames generating, and nether portal frames do not function in the end. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 16:06, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

Proposal: redefine what Technical Block is, renovate, and keep article

At the risk of proposing too many things on this topic, here's another proposal:

• Define a Technical Block as "Item form of blocks not normally obtainable in inventory"
• Note that these were largely removed in 1.7.2–1.8 (except farmland I guess)
• Explain that these were usually hacked into inventory through external tools or glitches
• Explain the difference as to why it was possible to obtain them before, but not now – something to the effect of explaining roughly how the code works now versus then
• Remove any blocks in the list that weren't actually possible to "obtain in inventory" (1.8 blocks?), and remove any blocks that you can just /give legitimately.
• They probably don't all need Block boxes; they would probably only have Item boxes, and minimal at that

I think this might make it smaller, tighter, and keep the focus on the fact that this is a category of block that is largely gone / deprecated / bugfixed.

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 21:48, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

EDIT -- What about a page like this User:Sealbudsman/Sandbox/Technical Blocks ?

It's just a preview with the first dozen or so blocks (and last few) to illustrate how it could look. I wouldn't finish it unless it's worthwhile.

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 14:43, 1 April 2015 (UTC)

 Against – This variant is fine, but there is no official meaning of the “technical block” term. — NickTheRed37 ^t/_c (f.k.a. Naista2002) 06:41, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

Well, good point. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 15:14, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

I do like the way you've presented the blocks in a more concise layout and by separating them into sections based on history. I do agree that they should probably go to removed features but not exactly sure on your definition of technical blocks - it is not an official term but that doesn't stop the wiki from using it if there is a consensus. –Goandgoo ᐸ Talk
Contribs
Edits 23:57, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

I looked through the edit history, but didn't look at the very oldest edits to see any of the original interpretations of the term. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 00:46, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

I personally disagree with the definition of a technical block as the item form of blocks not normally obtainable in inventory. They are called technical blocks after all, not technical items. Keeping that definition causes blocks such as barriers and command blocks to be technical, as they are obtained only by commands as well. Overall the main point of the article is to describe the events, rather than the items, and as such it would still be relevant to the current version of the game.

I would propose a definition along the lines of "Technical blocks are blocks that either has no corresponding item form, or that have a sole purpose as an alternate state of another block."

• The latter part is specifically to match blocks such as burning furnaces and farmland, which are an alternate state of furnaces and dirt respectively, but still have item forms
• Along this definition, it would remove several of the blocks that really do not fit the category, such as signs, redstone, tripwire, mob heads, etc. which have an item used to place them.

Beyond that, I would agree with either splitting the article and using a category, or keeping the article with blocks along those lines. If the article is to be kept, Sealbudsman's proposal does not look bad, although the article might face the same problem as [https://minecraft.fandom.com/wiki/Materials materials] where it is basically a category, and really the only way to fix that would be this article describing the block in some way, which would be redundant if it is described again elsewhere. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 16:04, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

I agree in your first paragraph about the distinction of item vs. block. I did eventually (in my sandbox page) land on a definition of those blocks that are not meant to be manifested as items, or be obtained into the player's inventory, which sounds approximately the same sense as what you're saying.

An additional distinction I think your definition makes, if I understand it right, is whether a block is not normally obtainable, where normal sounds like it excludes commands, since you include barrier and command block. I think I drew the line so that blocks created with the intention that the player ought to be able to carry them around in inventory, regardless of whether it was due to a command, would be considered as normal – in creative play at least.

One thing my (revised in the sandbox) definition lacks that may be a strength in yours, is that I keep thinking in terms of whether a block is meant or was intended to be available. I think it would be good not to draw inferences like that, so I do like your piece about or ... an alternate state of another block, it seems to nail it down a little better. I wonder how you would describe your definition working with the unpowered and powered comparators, the lit/unlit torches, redstone lamps, etc – which are the "alternate states"? I have a hard time writing out what should be an obvious answer to that question.

I agree to the criticism that the page could constitute 'basically a category', although, it doesn't seem (to me) to be a category of actual pages that we'd be willing to make. Unless of course we made subpages, like Water/Flowing Water, transcluded into Water, and then again categorized into Category:Technical blocks – or something like that. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 17:04, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

As for blocks like the repeater, my definition would conciser the unpowered repeater/redstone lamp, and the powered redstone torch as standard blocks, as those are placed directly by the item (the item does have a separate ID in two of those cases, but that is just to allow more advance placement, so it is still is basically the item form).

With the powered repeater/redstone lamp, and the unpowered redstone torch, the "main state" is placed then it changes to the alternate state based on the environment, making it technical. Also, since the alternate state cannot be placed directly, it lacks an item form, making it technical again. Generally, the "main state" can be defined as the form with an item form, although in the case of farmland or a burning furnace, it needs to be further defined, such as by the fact the block will revert to the "main state" (trampling it and running out of fuel, respectively) or the fact that the "main state" can be obtained in survival.

As for the basically a category part, in this case, the fact that it is a category of blocks rather than of articles would in theory allow it to be an article (similar to that of renewable resource), though some additional text would still be relevant, if only a brief description on what makes it a technical block. Otherwise, a solution might be something similar to Category:Renewable resources (same topic as the other solution it seems...), where redirects are in the category in cases where the only part of the main article fits the category. This is basically the reason I said I agreed with either solution. –KnightMiner ^t/_c 18:01, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

 Changed my mind. The only thing I personally cared about – figuring out historically when things were removed from the /give command, not losing that crucial bit, getting it out onto the wiki properly – is taken care of anyhow, so I have no real attachment to keeping this page as such. Or necessarily my own sandbox page for that matter. I would be fine with creating a category out of it, if that's how we did it. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 17:04, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

 Comment I've notified ru.Wiki Represetative GreenStone of this problem. He says that we may need an interwiki-wide discussion about this. —  NickTheRed37 (talk|contributions) 07:34, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

That would be interesting. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 09:22, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

Has that begun yet? – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 01:20, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

No, it isn't even prepared. We'll let you know. — Agent NickTheRed37 (talk) 06:25, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 15:17, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

New details: GreenStone wants to tell out his treating of the term. No interwiki-wide discussion will be made, just separate discussions on Russian and English wikis (for now?). — Agent NickTheRed37 (talk) 07:22, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

.name block should be renamed to info_reserved6

".name" in Pocket Edition is not the name of any block, ".name" is a string appended to the end of any objects's name when displayed in-game in order to tell the game to get the display name of a specified object (objects referring to any blocks, items, or entities). The display name of the ".name" block doesn't exist (i.e., it's an empty string), and ".name" is then appended to that empty string and displayed in-game. The true name of the ".name" block is "info_reserved6" according to the game's decompiled binary, which is why it should be renamed to its true name of "info_reserved6". Here is a screenshot of the decompiled source showing the name as evidence: http://i.imgur.com/FeWwXmW.png Jocopa3 (talk) 10:28, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

Tile Entity NBT is absent for AirPortal

If it has an NBT structure, it doesn't seem to be documented here on the wiki. – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 18:39, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, it has no NBT tags. According to Block entity, it's just used to create the particle effects. -- Orthotope^talk 06:23, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

I looked at the MCP code for 1.8; AirPortalTileEntity inherits TileEntity, which has the standard Id, x, y and z. It's a totally empty class, which is unusual & unique among tile entities -- although AirPortalTileEntityRenderer seems to make use of it, so I suspect that block entity is probably correct. It's obfuscated though, so I'll probably make an effort sometime to delve into tile entities further. Any resources you may know would be appreciated! – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 16:03, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

All set! – Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^t/_c 15:58, 20 May 2015 (UTC)

What about this definition of "technical block"

I had previously understood the term to mean: blocks which don't appear in their block form as items (doors,water etc) -- 'unobtainable' was a term we were using. -- but I came to understand there was some dispute on that.

So how about:

Technical blocks are blocks which the player does not directly interact with, that are designed to perform a function.

I argue this includes only piston extension block (36) and Searge's worldgen block.

In fact it's a definition crafted to exclude the zoo of blocks that the current "serving various purposes" definition allows -- things like redstone alternate states, portals, monster spawners, cake, info_reserved, update block, etc. It also excludes piston head (34), since that's an interactable block, e.g. you can break it, make tables or walls out of it etc -- even though it's an 'unobtainable' block in the item/block sense we've been using.

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^T/_C 17:31, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

I think with that definition, there would not be enough remaining content to justify this article (with just two blocks).

The best alternate definition I can think of to replace that though is any block whose main function is related to the usage of another block, which leaves blocks such as portal blocks (due to the usage of end portal frames/obsidian), technical piston blocks, various inverted and lit forms, and the PE update game block (which is a data default). It would exclude blocks like plants (since their usage is mainly tied into the item form), separate block/item cases (since their usage is tied to the block form, with the item being a means to get it), and the mutlipart blocks (since both parts use the same block ID, hence being usage of the same block) –KnightMiner ^t/_c 15:01, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Yeah.. every time I tackle the idea, I'm reminded that everyone has a slightly different understanding of what this unofficial term meams. I still support merging out the sections and eventual deletion of this article, per the discussion above.

– Sealbudsman (Aaron) ^T/_C 17:55, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

 Support. This is a very good suggestion. Although this definition still hardly makes technical blocks distinct from blockstates, it's the most inclusive of the ones suggested, so it's probably the best one to work with at the moment. And frankly it is much clearer than the vague definition we currently have, so let's go ahead and try this out. In this case I'll remove blocks that don't fall under this stricter definition; hopefully that will clean up the page a little bit, and if not, feel free to revert any of the changes made. Thanks. Superspace (talk) 00:10, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Technical blocks do not mean "uninteracted" blocks, they mean "conventionally unobtainable" blocks. For example: Nether and end portal. Players directly interact with these blocks, but they can not conventionally obtain these blocks as an item. Another example: Water and lava. Similar to nether and end portal. Umucraft (talk) 11:37, 9 December 2022 (UTC)

My technical block definition: They are blocks which can not be conventionally obtained, but it is used in some circumstances. Umucraft (talk) 11:42, 9 December 2022 (UTC)