In this article I want to document how to setup a Minecraft server on raspberry pi (3). The content is heavily borrowed by jankarres.

Step 1

First of all you should configure your raspberry pi

sudo raspi-config

1. Expand Filesystem
2. Change user password
3. Change hostname
4. Set boot to CLI
5. Set GPU Memory to 16
6. Update your localisation settings

Step 2 (optional)

Expand your swap file-size.

sudo su -c 'echo "CONF_SWAPSIZE=2048" > /etc/dphys-swapfile'
sudo dphys-swapfile setup
sudo dphys-swapfile swapon

Step 3

Install dependencies.

sudo apt-get install git screen

Step 4

Download & patch the Spigot server.

wget https://hub.spigotmc.org/jenkins/job/BuildTools/lastSuccessfulBuild/artifact/target/BuildTools.jar
java -Xmx1G -jar BuildTools.jar

Step 5

Create a run script to start the Minecraft server.

Keep in mind that you have to update the spigot version number inside the run script @ spigot-1.8.jar.

#!/bin/sh
BINDIR=$(dirname "$(readlink -fn "$0")")
cd "$BINDIR"
java -Xmx1024M -XX:ParallelGCThreads=8 -Xincgc -XX:+UseConcMarkSweepGC -XX:+UseParNewGC -XX:+CMSIncrementalPacing -XX:+AggressiveOpts -XX:+CMSParallelRemarkEnabled -XX:+DisableExplicitGC -XX:MaxGCPauseMillis=500 -XX:SurvivorRatio=16 -XX:TargetSurvivorRatio=90 -XX:+UseAdaptiveGCBoundary -XX:-UseGCOverheadLimit -Xnoclassgc -XX:UseSSE=3 -XX:LargePageSizeInBytes=4m -jar spigot-1.8.jar nogui

Step 6

Add permission.

sudo chmod +x run.sh

Step 7

Start your server for the first time.

sudo ./run.sh

Step 8

Accept the EULA by setting eula=true in the eula.txt.

vi eula.txt

Step 9

Update the default config of the spigot server to improve the performance.

Config download: spigot_config_2015.02.tar.gz

Step 10 (optional)

Start your Minecraft server in a screen session so it keeps running in the ‘background’.

1. Navigate to your server’s directory.

2. Run the command: screen -S ScreenNameGoesHere

3. Then you’ll be in your screen session, so run the server startup script.

4. To leave the screen session (and leave it running) press and hold CTRL, A, D (in that order).

5. To resume the screen session run the command: screen -r ScreenNameGoesHere

6. To kill the screen session run the command: screen -S ScreenNameGoesHere -X kill

Availability

If you want to make your server public available you need to use a dynip service like: noip.com