As MANY of you know bukkit has joined mojang. But I myself have many questions left unanswered, maybe you guys can help me out here. When the bukkit-dev-team-created mc API is released, will it have a bukkit go away? Will it be easy for developers to switch over? Will it be easy adding plugins like in bukkit, or will it be more similar to the current mc API? What will happen to the bukkit community when it is released? Will it be as easy for developers to develop for it as it is now? Please your ideas on these, or maybe add a question of your own.
My opinion is that by Bukkit joining Mojang, the mc API will merge the benefits of Bukkit with the mc API to create a way more friendly arena for mod development that doesn't require a third party API installation. It's a great way to really clean everything up and tie it together. This way, mod development, releases, and updates will probably come a lot quicker, I hope! The way I look at it, World of Warcraft has a lot of mod development, and you don't need a third-party World of Warcraft installation to use addons. If you've played WoW, then you probably know how useful that application would be to Minecraft! I don't post much, but I do browse the forums and try to stay up to date on stuff, but the community itself will probably merge to the Minecraft forum, or this one will become some sort of modding forum
Although nobody knows exactly how this will all play out, I believe LogSpoon's thoughts are pretty spot on. As a casual plugin developer, I'm quite interested to see how things shake out. But I'm pretty confident we'll end up with something as good or, more likely, better than we have now.
yes, it will go away. This is from the frontpage news. The bad thing is they can't use bukkit's code to develop the Mojang API. Because the licensing. So many people contributed to bukkit's code, its almost imposible to track them down, and ask their permission. If 1 person says no, its dead. What i'm affraid of is, there is no "guarantee" that the existing bukkit plugins will work for mojang API. If thats really happening, we (server owners) are in hell.
Well maybe I can answer some of your questions. Once the new API is out bukkit.org won't be going away. Will craftbukkit stop being updated? Only after the replacement is as good as or better than CraftBukkit. Will it be easy to switch over? This is just my personal opinion but the way I figure it, since it's the team that updated hMod and wrote Bukkit, any new API they write won't be radically different so it should not be that hard to switch over. Also my own opinion, there are only so few ways one can write an API for a game like Minecraft, so there's another point I think towards it being easy to switch over. Will it be easy to add plugins? I find it hard to believe that they would make it harder than it is now to add plugins, it might even be easier. Also, there is no current mc API, but I imagine you mean as it is with having to crack open a jar and drop in class files. What will happen to the community? Well again bukkit.org isn't going anywhere. The focus of the community might change, but who knows. It's too early to know right now. And as for will it be easy for developers to develop, I figure my opinion on the switching over question applies here. Shouldn't be too hard to switch, shouldn't be too hard to write from scratch either. A good amount of this is my personal opinion, though, but mostly because it's too early to know now. In time we'll know more, but for now we don't know all the specifics. Well, on the first note we don't know that, you're assuming that any new API will be closed-source when we have no information one way or another. As for the second note, that isn't how it works. It is not only not hard to figure out who wrote any given part of the code, but if a person says no to allowing re-licensing only the parts they wrote need to be rewritten.
This is true, forgot that it was a decision independent of the whole license issue to rewrite anyway. Still doesn't mean it can't be compatible or very similar. Time will tell though.
The only question regarding this as I have is: When will the new, official, API be released? Are we talking two months, one year, two years? The reason I ask this is not to act impatient, it's just that if it's in two months, then I can wait with developing a lot of plugins since I need to change my code for the new API anyways. But if it's in two years, then I can develop the plugin now so that at least it's useable for two years...
Well can't bukkit just use the current code, as the people who contributed to it are under the codes license, so doesn't that mean Bukkit have the full control of the code?
The new API will be pretty awesome because it will be made with the code and not with obfuscated code. Bukkit will be going away, but it won't be for a few months. I hope that the forums themselves are possibly, renamed, but for sure kept? I do not want to merge with the Mincraft Forums! That would be horrible!?!
I doubt that. Why would anyone need a third party mod if Minecraft gets a built-in API as good as Bukkit?
Because Bukkit will be absorbed into the Minecraft Official Server, and if has been learned out of this whole situation, it is that there will always be opportunities to improve the official software with a modded server.
What about huge server using important plugins? Like Super-earth using Towny. Without Towny, Super-Earth is nothing. Would those plugins be moved over to this new platform, or is it up to the developers to "convert" it?
It'll be up to the developers to convert it to the new API. Bukkit did say they would try to make bukkit plugins work with new API, but they highly doubt it will work.
No, because of GPL restrictions, unless they plan on making their Minecraft API also open-source. EDIT: This was also answered above by NuclearW.