Arcitec
commented
3 weeks ago Hello @ell1e.
The reason this is happening is because this Flatpak is completely incorrectly created. @AsciiWolf may want to know what's wrong, so it can be fixed, though:
- It uses a 2+ year old, buggy Minecraft Launcher version (v1.0.1221) from an old, dead URL from March 2022.
- It "fetches updates" via a URL that has a static hash which never changes, thus never delivering newer versions. Although Microsoft may just have stopped using that update-check URL at all.
- The bug is here: https://github.com/flathub/com.mojang.Minecraft/blob/8068682d500c7f3d94cd627c5531d8d6547dc9c3/com.mojang.Minecraft.json#L68-L78
You can even see how old that version is if you check the URL. That launcher is from 2022, whereas the newest launcher file I linked to below is from October 2024.
Relevant part:
"name": "1.0.1221",
"released": "2022-03-23T23:03:04+00:00"Full response:
{
"jre-x64": [],
"jre-x86": [],
"launcher-bootstrap": [
{
"availability": {
"group": 2631,
"progress": 100
},
"manifest": {
"sha1": "d72c08ef9605e645fd81f705d66b8ebd9620d7a1",
"size": 466,
"url": "https://piston-meta.mojang.com/v1/packages/d72c08ef9605e645fd81f705d66b8ebd9620d7a1/manifest.json"
},
"version": {
"name": "1.0.1221",
"released": "2022-03-23T23:03:04+00:00"
}
}
],
"launcher-bootstrap-ado": [
{
"availability": {
"group": 5478,
"progress": 100
},
"manifest": {
"sha1": "70d6d24a24406dbeb80cda53ac70be6944e2e279",
"size": 466,
"url": "https://piston-meta.mojang.com/v1/packages/70d6d24a24406dbeb80cda53ac70be6944e2e279/manifest.json"
},
"version": {
"name": "1.2.30",
"released": "2023-06-23T15:56:44+00:00"
}
}
],
"launcher-core": [
{
"availability": {
"group": 1729,
"progress": 100
},
"manifest": {
"sha1": "ea71747a98dd806fb3b77cdc50fa69ea9092855d",
"size": 28504,
"url": "https://piston-meta.mojang.com/v1/packages/ea71747a98dd806fb3b77cdc50fa69ea9092855d/manifest.json"
},
"version": {
"name": "2.2.2141",
"released": "2021-03-01T12:01:53+00:00"
}
}
],
"launcher-core-ado": [
{
"availability": {
"group": 4117,
"progress": 100
},
"manifest": {
"sha1": "0f5faa36de53cc2883b501a7a18e402966930f2b",
"size": 34647,
"url": "https://piston-meta.mojang.com/v1/packages/0f5faa36de53cc2883b501a7a18e402966930f2b/manifest.json"
},
"version": {
"name": "2.4.104",
"released": "2023-06-02T22:28:50+00:00"
}
}
],
"launcher-core-v2": [
{
"availability": {
"group": 4022,
"progress": 100
},
"manifest": {
"sha1": "f274468b435cbe5369c9787d31cba7fe16102c69",
"size": 29504,
"url": "https://piston-meta.mojang.com/v1/packages/f274468b435cbe5369c9787d31cba7fe16102c69/manifest.json"
},
"version": {
"name": "2.2.12148",
"released": "2022-03-24T03:13:44+00:00"
}
}
],
"launcher-java": [
{
"availability": {
"group": 261,
"progress": 100
},
"manifest": {
"sha1": "f1bd83c4f1ec402992649a994596ffe64c4630d6",
"size": 295,
"url": "https://piston-meta.mojang.com/v1/packages/f1bd83c4f1ec402992649a994596ffe64c4630d6/manifest.json"
},
"version": {
"name": "1.6.93",
"released": "2019-09-12T09:06:53+00:00"
}
}
],
"launcher-msi-patch": []
}The actual up-to-date Minecraft Launcher is at https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/download/alternative and the correct download URL is https://launcher.mojang.com/download/Minecraft.tar.gz
The entire Flatpak manifest needs a rewrite to do this. And to use a different Flatpak Manifest auto-update check method. There may be a x-checker-data method that looks at the server's "last-modified" headers, since they never change the launcher download's filename anymore.
Edit: It may need a new x-checker-data feature: https://github.com/flathub-infra/flatpak-external-data-checker/issues/442
As for Ellie, you should really consider using ATLauncher instead:
https://flathub.org/apps/com.atlauncher.ATLauncher
Here's a video about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P21LUffrL1w
It auto-manages Mojang Java for you, supports installing modpacks with one click (from CurseForge, Modrinth, FTB and Technic, and others), lets you create multiple Minecraft versions ("instances") with different modpacks to try them out, and it works a lot more reliably than the official launcher.
More technical users can use Prism Launcher. It's very powerful but fiddly (one of the weirdest things is that you must manually go to "Edit" after creating an instance and then "Versions: Download All" to download the necessary files for an instance). And I am not sure if the prebuilt Flatpak version supports auto-managing Mojang Java yet (but the latest development code does, which is what I use). I can recommend it for technical users though, since it gives a great overview of everything that goes on, and supports modding from all sources (CurseForge, Modrinth, FTB, Technic, ATLauncher and others).
Actually, Prism can be used by anyone who is willing to take a few minutes to watch a video about how to use it. It's a great launcher. Just a bit clunky to learn its UI the first time you use it.
https://flathub.org/apps/org.prismlauncher.PrismLauncher
Hope this helps! :)
AsciiWolf
I just tried the launcher after waiting for a while for "Downloading update files..." to finish. Then I logged in and disabled hw acceleration so it won't interfere with games as much and immediately restarted it, mere seconds after launching. But when I had restarted the launcher, I got the "Download update files..." popup again starting over from 0%. Since that just completed a few minutes ago, I'm assuming this is likely to be a bug of some sort.
Problem seen with launcher version: 1.0.1221 from flathub
Problem seen with linux system: postmarketOS Edge x64 based on Alpine 3.21.0_alpha20240923