Software to launch game servers when specific ports sent a packet

[ispaure]

I am looking for a software, or a tutorial etc. to launch my game servers when a packet is sent to specific ports

ie. Keep my Minecraft server closed, then when someone tries to join on port 25565, launch the server. After 1 hour of inactivity, close the server

Each game server I have is on a different port, so it'd have to be able to listen to various ports and answer accordingly.

Any help much appreciated

 

[greenhawk]

you might be able to write some software that could start the game server, not sure about the closing it (nicely anyway) as most game servers are not designed to be closed from the command line. They want something typed into the service console.

Not sure what you are trying to achieve given most servers will sit idle when no one is connected, so not using resources / power ect.

 

[Markbnj]

This could be done if you had the skills and sufficient need. I don't know of any off the shelf package. You basically need to write a service that can proxy that port to an instance of the game server that it starts.

 

[yinan]

You would have to integrate this into a firewall, which would probably be difficult because all traffic hits the firewall. All of the timers that you want also make this increasingly difficult.