By far the easiest way to work with mod and plugins, especially large numbers of them, is to utilize modpacks with [one of the supported mod platforms](../types-and-platforms/index.md).
There are optional volume paths that can be attached to supply content to be copied into the data area:
`/plugins`
: contents are synchronized into `/data/plugins` for Bukkit related server types. The source can be changed by setting `COPY_PLUGINS_SRC`. The destination can be changed by setting `COPY_PLUGINS_DEST`. Set `SYNC_SKIP_NEWER_IN_DESTINATION=false` if you want files from `/plugins` to take precedence over newer files in `/data/plugins`.
`/mods`
: contents are synchronized into `/data/mods` for Fabric and Forge related server types. The source can be changed by setting `COPY_MODS_SRC`. The destination can be changed by setting `COPY_MODS_DEST`.
`/config`
: contents are synchronized into `/data/config` by default, but can be changed with `COPY_CONFIG_DEST`. The source can be changed by setting `COPY_CONFIG_SRC`. For example, `-v ./config:/config -e COPY_CONFIG_DEST=/data` will allow you to copy over files like `bukkit.yml` and so on directly into the server directory. Set `SYNC_SKIP_NEWER_IN_DESTINATION=false` if you want files from `/config` to take precedence over newer files in `/data/config`.
By default, the [environment variable processing](../configuration/interpolating.md) is performed on synchronized files that match the expected suffixes in `REPLACE_ENV_SUFFIXES` (by default "yml,yaml,txt,cfg,conf,properties,hjson,json,tml,toml") and are not excluded by `REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLES_EXCLUDES` and `REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLES_EXCLUDE_PATHS`. This processing can be disabled by setting `REPLACE_ENV_DURING_SYNC` to `false`.
If you want old mods/plugins to be removed before the content is brought over from those attach points, then add `-e REMOVE_OLD_MODS=TRUE`. You can fine tune the removal process by specifying the `REMOVE_OLD_MODS_INCLUDE` and `REMOVE_OLD_MODS_EXCLUDE` variables, which are comma separated lists of file glob patterns. If a directory is excluded, then it and all of its contents are excluded. By default, only jars are removed.
You can also specify the `REMOVE_OLD_MODS_DEPTH` (default is 16) variable to only delete files up to a certain level.
For example: `-e REMOVE_OLD_MODS=TRUE -e REMOVE_OLD_MODS_INCLUDE="*.jar" -e REMOVE_OLD_MODS_DEPTH=1` will remove all old jar files that are directly inside the `plugins/` or `mods/` directory.
These paths work well if you want to have a common set of modules in a separate location, but still have multiple worlds with different server requirements in either persistent volumes or a downloadable archive.
To install all the server content (jars, mods, plugins, configs, etc.) from a zip or tgz file, then set `GENERIC_PACK` to the container path or URL of the archive file. This can also be used to apply a CurseForge modpack that is missing a server start script and/or Forge installer.
If multiple generic packs need to be applied together, set `GENERIC_PACKS` instead, with a comma separated list of archive file paths and/or URLs to files.
To avoid repetition, each entry will be prefixed by the value of `GENERIC_PACKS_PREFIX` and suffixed by the value of `GENERIC_PACKS_SUFFIX`, both of which are optional. For example, the following variables
```
GENERIC_PACKS=configs-v9.0.1,mods-v4.3.6
GENERIC_PACKS_PREFIX=https://cdn.example.org/
GENERIC_PACKS_SUFFIX=.zip
```
would expand to `https://cdn.example.org/configs-v9.0.1.zip,https://cdn.example.org/mods-v4.3.6.zip`.
If applying large generic packs, the update can be time-consuming. To skip the update set `SKIP_GENERIC_PACK_UPDATE_CHECK` to "true". Conversely, the generic pack(s) can be forced to be applied by setting `FORCE_GENERIC_PACK_UPDATE` to "true".
The most time-consuming portion of the generic pack update is generating and comparing the SHA1 checksum. To skip the checksum generation, set `SKIP_GENERIC_PACK_CHECKSUM` to "true.
You may also download or copy over individual mods/plugins using the `MODS` or `PLUGINS` environment variables. Both are a comma or newline delimited list of
- URL of a jar file
- container path to a jar file
- container path to a directory containing jar files
```shell
docker run -d -e MODS=https://www.example.com/mods/mod1.jar,/plugins/common,/plugins/special/mod2.jar ...
```
The newline delimiting allows for compose file usage like:
As an alternative to `MODS`/`PLUGINS`, the variable `MODS_FILE` or `PLUGINS_FILE` can be set with the container path or URL of a text file listing a mod/plugin URLs on each line. For example, the following
Blank lines and lines that start with a `#` will be ignored
[This compose file](https://github.com/itzg/docker-minecraft-server/blob/master/examples/docker-compose-mods-file.yml) shows another example of using this feature.
When the `MODPACK` option above is specified you can also instruct script to delete old mods/plugins prior to installing new ones. This behaviour is desirable in case you want to upgrade mods/plugins from downloaded zip file.
