Absolute Order (formerly Chest Separators) is an inventory-organization mod built around a Virtual Overlay System: instead of crafting physical dividers that waste slots, it paints separators and per-slot filters directly onto the container GUI, and enforces those filters server-side for real item-routing behavior (shift-click, hoppers, auto-deposit).
Version 2.0 — "The Liftoff Update" rebuilt the project from a single Fabric mod into one shared codebase that ships for Fabric, NeoForge and Forge across nine Minecraft versions (1.12.2 → 26.2), spanning five distinct rendering eras.
⚠️ Engineering Focus This project is a study in cross-version portability: a common source set driven by Architectury + Mojmap/Parchment, an abstraction over five rendering eras (from legacyMatrixStackto modernRenderPipelines), a server-authoritative persistence layer using Data Components / chunk NBT, and heavy Java bytecode manipulation via SpongePowered Mixins for insertion rules, hopper routing and GUI hooks.
Colored lines between slots and per-slot backgrounds painted onto any container GUI. A custom slot-hitting algorithm allows fluid drag & paint (pencil/brush/area/trace) across the grid, rendered on the client tick for zero input lag. A real-time HSV→RGB engine generates any of 16.7M colors with an eyedropper and per-layer custom palettes, and layouts are deep-copied through an NBT clipboard to replicate a design across containers instantly.
The editor floats over the container grid with layered depth control and per-zone tools, so it never Z-fights with the slots underneath.
Per-slot rules deciding which items may enter a slot, built by dragging items in and out of a filter and grouping slots into one logical unit.
A filter's item order is a priority order you arrange by dragging — it drives which slot each item lands in, and powers one-click auto-sort. Rules are enforced for manual placement, shift-click and hoppers (each axis toggleable), refused at the insertion mixin rather than silently swallowed.
Whole filter setups can be saved as presets and reapplied to any container. Filters on block containers travel with the block (Data Component → chunk NBT); entity inventories and the Ender Chest are client-local.
One keystroke sweeps matching items from your inventory into nearby filtered storage…
…or pulls items from storage to top up your filtered inventory slots. Every action ships a live preview generated by the same ordering primitive as the real operation, so the predicted result and the server's authoritative result can never drift.
Everything is tunable through a Cloth Config screen with rebindable keys, and the editor declares REI / EMI / JEI exclusion zones so it never overlaps recipe UIs. Localized into 20 languages.
Modern ports use an Architectury common/ + loader modules layout: the feature code lives once in common, and thin Fabric / NeoForge / Forge modules bind it to each platform's entrypoints, networking and registration. The legacy 1.12.2 port is a separate hand-written Forge project (MCP names, no Architectury) that shares the design but not the code.
The dual-layer rendering pipeline (persistent separators behind items, transient editor UI on top) is written against five eras and selected per version:
| Era | Representative | GUI primitive |
|---|---|---|
| E5 | 26.1 / 26.2 / 1.21.11 | RenderPipelines |
| E4 | 1.21.1 / 1.20.1 | GuiGraphics |
| E3 | 1.19.2 | GuiGraphics (early) |
| E2 | 1.18.2 / 1.16.5 | PoseStack / MatrixStack |
| E1 | 1.12.2 | legacy immediate mode |
A polymorphic data strategy picks the storage path per target:
- Block containers → server-authoritative Data Component that rides the block into chunk NBT.
- Entities (minecarts, llamas…) → keyed by the entity's persistent
UUID. - Client-local visuals + inventory/Ender-Chest filters → per-world
.datNBT files.
Item-count serialization, item-equality and the resource-id API all differ by version (byte vs VarInt on the wire, isSameItemSameComponents vs isSameItemSameTags vs a meta-aware ItemKey); these are centralized so one change propagates cleanly across all nine ports.
Insertion is a 4-pass deposit sweep — filtered stacking → filtered filling → unfiltered stacking → unfiltered filling — and every automatic path (shift, hopper, grab, deposit) shares one FilterPriority ordering primitive, expressed as a conditional refusal so vanilla performs the actual transfer and client/server stay in agreement.
| Minecraft | Loaders | Build JDK |
|---|---|---|
| 26.2, 26.1 | Fabric, NeoForge | 25 |
| 1.21.11, 1.21.1 | Fabric, NeoForge | 21 |
| 1.20.1, 1.19.2, 1.18.2, 1.16.5 | Fabric, Forge | 21 |
| 1.12.2 | Forge | 11 |
Quilt runs the Fabric jar. Release jars are named
AbsoluteOrder-<version>-<loader>-mc<version-or-range>.jar.
- Install the matching loader (Fabric, NeoForge, or Forge) for your Minecraft version.
- Add the dependencies noted on the download page — Fabric API (Fabric) and Architectury API on the modern ports.
- Drop the jar for your version + loader into your
modsfolder.
Multiplayer: filters on block containers are server-authoritative, so the mod must be installed on the server for those filters to persist online. Visual separators and inventory filters are client-side and work without a modded server.
Gradle + Architectury Loom, one module per version. Build a module with its required JDK:
# from a version module directory (e.g. multiloader-1.20.1/)
./gradlew buildJDKs: 21 for the modern ports, 25 for the 26.x ports, 11 for legacy 1.12.2.
Created and maintained by marcsanz-dev. Looking for the internals? Start at common/src/main/java/... (or src/ on 1.12.2) for the Mixin and networking implementation.