HOWTO: Installing Java for firefox.

[johanvrt]

you did "In" as in (In)sert
It should be "ln" , short for link.
ln -s , meaning link symbolicly

deFrysk. 8)

[rjl]

Thanks guys!

I was typing In as (In)sert. I now have java 1.5 working in firefox.

I find it easy to make dumb mistakes with computers.

[muypill]

Yeah, that was it. Thanks a lot. I now feel more dumb.

[CyberSeal]

why doesn't Ubuntu include a package for installing java automatically?
like the one made for flash plugin.
are there any legal issues ?

[smoothrt]

I am still looking for newbie-friendly directions on how to do this for amd64 and can't find anything. Can someone post directions, or at least a link of a way to get java installed and working in firefox for ubuntu amd64. It's been very frustrating, and would finish my tweaking of my OS. Thank you.

[adbak]

I don't know if there are any legal issues, but I do know that Sun wants everyone to download Java from them. Although this only leads to people hating them....

[LongTooth]

Quick question: If I have Mozilla installed as well as Firefox (and I do) will I have to do anything different or will this procedure install Java in both browsers?

[smoothrt]

I don't know how it can be true that you have to go to sun's website for legal reasons. I have tried many other linux distributions, and while I have found Ubuntu to be my favorite, other distributions, even amd64 versions, had java already working upon installing (i.e. Mandrake). This really should be easier, it's the last "major" thing I can't get working on my system.

[butters]

ubuntu has adopted a completely free/open-source strategy like that of Red Hat, Debian, and Fedora. This is fine, but I would like to see the following happen:

1. Give users the option to install a selected "non-free" software set during installation, right before grabbing updates from the internet. This set would include mpeg123, libdvdcss, flash, and possibly some others (the most common non-free packages). The only major one that could not be installed at this point is Java, since it requires manual download from the net.

2. Include the universe repositories by default, but clearly warn users when they mark universe packages for installation (or print a confirmation message if using CLI).

3. Include every package that ubuntu devs know how to install, even if the process requires manual intervention. In the case of Java, the terminal ouput during the package installation should stop and prompt for users to follow the provided link to the vendor's download page and get the binary. After loading the binary from the user's home directory (determined by querying which user sudo is speaking for), or whichever download directory is specified, and running, it should create the appropriate symlinks/registry keys. This is sort of how Gentoo handles Java, only it provides the link and requires the user to gain root and place the binary in /usr/portage/distfiles before running emerge again.

Because if the recipe for installing the java sdk and mozilla plugin is so simple, then it might as well have an ubuntu deb package. Users shouldn't have to search for some howto on installing the java plugin. They should ask Synaptic to find java and have Synaptic guide them through the installation process.

[butters]

I don't know how it can be true that you have to go to sun's website for legal reasons. I have tried many other linux distributions, and while I have found Ubuntu to be my favorite, other distributions, even amd64 versions, had java already working upon installing (i.e. Mandrake). This really should be easier, it's the last "major" thing I can't get working on my system.

You can find a binary for sun-jdk-1.5.0-rc-amd64 here:

http://public.planetmirror.com/pub/j...inux-amd64.bin

download it to your home directory and open a terminal:

sh ./jdk-1_5_0-rc-linux-amd64.bin
<scroll down through license and type 'yes'>
sudo mv jdk-1_5_0-rc /usr/local
cd .mozilla/plugins
ln -s /usr/local/jdk-1_5_0-rc/plugin/amd64/ns610-gcc32/libjavaplugin_oji.so libjavaplugin_oji.so

Then restart firefox and type 'about:plugins' in the URL box, this opens a page that summarized your installed plugins, and a healthly list of different java MIME types should be listed.

I don't have an AMD64 machine so I haven't run through this myself. The directory paths might be named slightly differently, tab completion is your friend.

Good luck.