PineconeMC: a Prism Launcher fork with Ely.by sign-in and working skins

A fork that replaces one mechanism, not just adding a login field

PineconeMC is a fork of Prism Launcher that adds integrated support for Ely.by accounts, and the README is clear that Microsoft accounts can still be used. The project positions itself against the many existing forks that add Ely.by support or disable the Microsoft account requirement, and says this one goes further than adding a login and password prompt plus an authlib-injector download. Two mechanisms differ from those forks. The sign-in is OAuth2, so credentials never reach the launcher at all. And the way Minecraft is patched for Ely.by accounts is Ely.by's official Authlib patches rather than authlib-injector, which is the detail that changes what a player can actually do. The README also states plainly that the fork is not endorsed by Prism Launcher or by Ely.by.

OAuth2 means the launcher never sees your password

The first reason given for the fork is a modern and secure login. PineconeMC uses OAuth2, which means the credentials are never transferred to the launcher. Instead you sign in on the official Ely.by page in your browser, and Ely.by hands the launcher a token with limited privileges. The practical difference from a password prompt is the blast radius. A launcher that stores a password, even encrypted, holds a credential that can be replayed against the account, while a token issued for this purpose is scoped and can be revoked server side. It also means the launcher never needs to be updated when Ely.by changes its login page, since the browser handles that flow rather than the application. For anyone who has been asked to paste a password into a third-party launcher, this is the substantive improvement, not a cosmetic one.

Skins work on plain servers because the patch is Ely.by's own

The second reason is skins, and this is the one that separates the fork from its competitors. The README says that all other forks rely exclusively on authlib-injector to patch Minecraft for Ely.by support, but authlib-injector cannot provide skins on servers that do not have a special skins plugin installed. PineconeMC uses Ely.by's official Authlib patches instead, which allows skins to be seen anywhere. For a player, that is the difference between a custom skin that works on the servers you use and one that only appears on a minority of them. The mechanism underneath is the same underlying idea, a launcher-injected agent that mediates the session with the account server, but the trust chain differs. Ely.by's own patches are the version that servers are built to understand.

Fake mirrors are the first thing the README warns about

The very first element in the README is a caution block stating that malicious links are circulating in the wild that disguise themselves as this project, and instructing readers to download PineconeMC from elyprismlauncher.github.io and/or pineconemc.ru. That warning belongs at the top because the failure mode is specific to this project. A Minecraft launcher that asks for account credentials is a natural target, and a fork with a Russian-language site and a distribution network is exactly the shape of thing that impersonation pages imitate. The rest of the project information is consistent with that framing. The homepage is pineconemc.ru, all downloads and instructions are on the GitHub releases page, and the build status is in the GitHub Actions tab. Three sources of truth, and only two of them are domains you should type.

Releases and development builds are separated on purpose

Stable builds live on the Releases page, with the latest release linked directly, and the last build status visible in the GitHub Actions tab. Development builds are a separate thing, available from GitHub Actions, including builds from pull requests opened by contributors, and from nightly.link, which always points to the latest version of the develop branch. The README is blunt about what those are for: they are not intended for most users, there may be bugs and other instabilities, and you have been warned. It also notes that the binaries contain debug information, so the file sizes are relatively larger. That last point is a useful diagnostic, because a download much bigger than the release build tells you which channel you are actually on.

The upstream redistribution policy applies to anyone building it

The README reproduces the Prism Launcher forking and redistribution policy, and it is worth reading because it constrains what you may do with a build. You are free to fork, redistribute and provide custom builds as long as you follow the licence terms, which is a legal responsibility, and the policy asks that anyone who changed code rather than merely repackaging makes it clear that the fork is not Prism Launcher and is not endorsed by or affiliated with the project. Concretely, that means editing CMakeLists.txt to change Prism Launcher's API keys to your own or setting them to empty strings to disable the functionality that needs them. Distributors who are only packaging for their own platform are told to set Launcher_BUILD_PLATFORM to a slug for their distribution, with archlinux, fedora and nixpkgs given as examples.

Build-time API keys carry terms you accept by shipping them

There is a legal trap in the build configuration, and the README states it plainly. If you build the software without removing the API keys in CMakeLists.txt, you are accepting the Microsoft Identity Platform Terms of Use and the CurseForge 3rd Party API Terms and Conditions. If you do not agree with those terms, the instruction is to remove the associated keys by setting them to an empty string, and the upstream policy says the program will still compile with the functionality that requires those keys disabled. This applies to anyone building a custom build for their own users, not just forkers. The repository root shows how much of Prism Launcher survives here, with launcher/, libraries/, cmake/, nix/, vcpkg.json and a flake.nix, plus epl_metadata.json which appears to be the fork's own metadata file.

GPL-3.0 code with separately licensed artwork

The licensing is split in two, which the README states clearly. All launcher code is available under the GPL-3.0-only licence, and the logo and related assets are under CC BY-SA 4.0. For a fork of this kind that split is normal, since artwork is often not compatible with a copyleft code licence, and it matters for anyone who repackages the application, because the assets carry their own attribution and share-alike obligations. The release history shows 11.1.1 on 2026-09-29, 11.1.0 on 2026-09-04 and 11.0.3 on 2026-07-12, and the last push was on 2026-09-29. The default branch is develop, and building from source follows the upstream Prism Launcher build instructions, since the fork inherits that build system.

Editorial conclusion

PineconeMC fits a player who signs in with an Ely.by account and wants Prism Launcher's instance management together with skins that work on ordinary servers, because the fork replaces the authlib-injector approach with Ely.by's own patches. It is a poor fit for a player who only uses Microsoft accounts, where the upstream launcher already works, and it is a poor choice for anyone who cannot verify the download source, since the README reports malicious links in the wild impersonating the project. Verify first that your binary came from elyprismlauncher.github.io or pineconemc.ru, and that the release tag you installed matches the version list on the releases page, before you enter any account credentials.

Frequently asked questions

Official sources

1. ElyPrismLauncher/Launcher on GitHub
2. License: GPL-3.0
3. Project website
4. README
5. Releases