An autocrafter has an interface just like a normal crafting table. There's a 3x3 grid where you load in materials, and a single square displaying the resulting product. However, it works a little differently. The 3x3 grid is actually an inventory hopper for the autocrafter, and the product square is actually the template, indicating what the autocrafter has been programmed to make. Once you set the template by arranging objects in the hopper, the template remains fixed until you click on it to clear it, and then reprogram the autocrafter by entering a new recipe.
Applying a redstone charge to an autocrafter causes it to attempt to use the materials in the hopper to create the object in the template, and spit it out on the floor like a dispenser or allocator would, perhaps to be picked up by an allocator. If there are insufficient materials in the hopper, nothing is produced, but the template remains. An allocator can be set up with a nearby chest to reload the autocrafter. The autocrafter will only accept items that fit into the current template's recipe.
So, you could build a bakery autocrafter which took in stacks of wheat from a nearby allocator and chests of wheat, and it would spit out loaves of bread to another allocator which would load them into chests, or minecarts to be shipped off for distribution. Or you could build an autocrafter that created new diamond mining picks to be shuttled off via mining cart to resupply the automated grinder whenever the pick needs replacing. And so on.
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After reading these threads:
http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/199625-new-block-the-allocator/
http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/566964-automating-minecraft-the-three-blocks-that-would-finish-the-game/
I thought of the autocrafter.
An autocrafter has an interface just like a normal crafting table. There's a 3x3 grid where you load in materials, and a single square displaying the resulting product. However, it works a little differently. The 3x3 grid is actually an inventory hopper for the autocrafter, and the product square is actually the template, indicating what the autocrafter has been programmed to make. Once you set the template by arranging objects in the hopper, the template remains fixed until you click on it to clear it, and then reprogram the autocrafter by entering a new recipe.
Applying a redstone charge to an autocrafter causes it to attempt to use the materials in the hopper to create the object in the template, and spit it out on the floor like a dispenser or allocator would, perhaps to be picked up by an allocator. If there are insufficient materials in the hopper, nothing is produced, but the template remains. An allocator can be set up with a nearby chest to reload the autocrafter. The autocrafter will only accept items that fit into the current template's recipe.
So, you could build a bakery autocrafter which took in stacks of wheat from a nearby allocator and chests of wheat, and it would spit out loaves of bread to another allocator which would load them into chests, or minecarts to be shipped off for distribution. Or you could build an autocrafter that created new diamond mining picks to be shuttled off via mining cart to resupply the automated grinder whenever the pick needs replacing. And so on.
To completely automate the production line. He gave two examples, derp.