A simple but efficient sugarcane farm for 1.11 (16w43a - 16w44a)
Apparently the recent 1.11 snapshot 16w43a trivialized harvesting sugarcane. This farm uses the easiest observer harvesting mechanism possible. Unfortunately this mechanism doesn't fling the drops consistent enough to justify building a multi-floor harvesting tower, so instead the next best thing is to build a long row with a single minecart underneath collecting the drops. You can make this row as long as you wish, you might wanna add some additional powered rails between both ends if the minecart slows down too much though.
I also showcase an alternate mechanism that does not involve any redstone that might be the better choice for servers since this'll reduce the lag the farm will produce. Thanks for ilmango for showing me this different harvesting mechanism, check him out on Youtube!