How do I use /setblock and what are the possible options?

Question

The Minecraft command /setblock is very exciting but poorly documented.

How do I use the command? For example to set a yellow stained glass at a certain location? To create a chest full of enchanted swords?

Answer 1

Here's the structure of the /setblock command:

/setblock x y z block data method [dataTag]

xyz are the coordinates of the block
block is the TileID of the block (includes id:0 now!)
data is the block data (i.e. 5:1 spruce wood)
method is one of three things: keep, replace, or delete

• keep spawns the block at the coordinates.
• replace replaces the block at the coordinates with the block ID.
• delete removes the block at the coordinates and then spawns the new one in

dataTag (optional) is tile entity data.

From Minecraft wiki

Answer 2

All I really need to know is a lot about the /setblock command's DataTags. I just can never figure out new ones. I do know some. Here are a few DataTags that I know, for setblock, summon, and give:

For /give player heads:

/give [player] minecraft:skull 1 3 {SkullOwner:[player]}

For /setblock spawners:

/setblock [x] [y] [z] minecraft:mob_spawner 0 [method] {EntityId:/ID used for //summon/}

For /summon equipment:

/summon [Zombie|Skeleton] [x] [y] [z] {Equipment:[{id:/no. ID of HAND equipped/},{id:/FEET/},{id:/LEGS/},{id:/CHEST/},{id:/HEAD/}]}

On the /summon one, on the head, I know how to put a player skull on the Zombie or Skeleton, and here is how: What goes in place of {id:[HEAD]} is {id:397,Damage:3,tag:{SkullOwner:} .

To make it a player, put a player's Username between the : and the } in {SkullOwner:} .