---
title: Sending commands
---

[RCON](http://wiki.vg/RCON) is enabled by default, so you can `exec` into the container to
access the Minecraft server console:

```
docker exec -i mc rcon-cli
```

Note: The `-i` is required for interactive use of rcon-cli.

To run a simple, one-shot command, such as stopping a Minecraft server, pass the command as arguments to `rcon-cli`, such as:

```
docker exec mc rcon-cli stop
```

_The `-i` is not needed in this case._

If rcon is disabled you can send commands by passing them as arguments to the packaged `mc-send-to-console` script. For example, a player can be op'ed in the container `mc` with: 

```shell
docker exec mc mc-send-to-console op player
            |                     |
            +- container name     +- Minecraft commands start here
```

In order to attach and interact with the Minecraft server, add `-it` when starting the container, such as

    docker run -d -it -p 25565:25565 --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

With that you can attach and interact at any time using

    docker attach mc

and then Control-p Control-q to **detach**.

For remote access, configure your Docker daemon to use a `tcp` socket (such as `-H tcp://0.0.0.0:2375`)
and attach from another machine:

    docker -H $HOST:2375 attach mc

Unless you're on a home/private LAN, you should [enable TLS access](https://docs.docker.com/articles/https/).