364390 - Java SE 6.0's Java Console extension has maxVersion = 2.0 ("java disabled after Firefox 2 upgrade")

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Firefox :: Extension Compatibility, defect)

Description

[Florian Effenberger]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; de; rv:1.8.1.1) Gecko/20061204 Firefox/2.0.0.1
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; de; rv:1.8.1.1) Gecko/20061204 Firefox/2.0.0.1

Java SE 6.0 is wrongly detected as incompatible plugin since 2.0.0.1
Although it is marked as incompatible, Java just works fine

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Install FF 2.0
2. Install Java SE 6.0
3. Upgrade to FF 2.0.0.1

Actual Results:  
Java SE 6.0 is wrongly detected as incompatible plugin

Expected Results:  
Java SE 6.0 should be compatible

Comment 1

[Simon Bünzli]

That's rather a job for the folks over at Sun, since they explicitly state that the Java Console is only compatible until Firefox 2.0 (instead of Firefox 2.0.0.*). I guess somebody should tell them...

Comment 2

[Florian Effenberger]

Thanks for the feedback! Do you have contacts to the Sun Java team? I try to forward it, but I can't promise.

Is the check of extensions via web? If so, it just has to be changed on your server to prevent from users being confused by the warning.

Comment 3

[Simon Bünzli]

AFAICT the check was purely locally. To make sure, please locate your Firefox installation (probably "C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox"), go to the "extensions" subfolder and there the subfolder not starting with "{972ce..." (nor "inspector@...").

Within that folder, you'll find a file install.rdf which contains a line saying maxVersion 2.0 and you should not find any line saying updateURL (which would indicate a place where Firefox can do the check online). If that's the case, a bug would probably be in order... http://bugs.sun.com/services/bugreport/

(Unfortunately, I've already removed that intrusive extension of theirs from my hard disk, so I can't do that check myself.)

Comment 4

[Florian Effenberger]

You are right, I have attached my file to this issue.

What needs to be done in order to fix that bug?
What exactly has to be modified in the file?

Is there a Firefox option for corporate deployment telling FF to ignore checking this extension, e.g. by using prefs.js, user.js or override.ini?

I want to start deploying the new version soon, that's why I ask :-)

Comment 5

[Florian Effenberger]

Attachment: install.rdf from Java SE 6.0

Comment 6

[Simon Bünzli]

(In reply to comment #4)
> What exactly has to be modified in the file?

You'd have to replace the 2.0 with 2.0.0.* in the maxVersion line.

> Is there a Firefox option for corporate deployment telling FF to ignore
> checking this extension, e.g. by using prefs.js, user.js or override.ini?

Not AFAICT. OTOH since that extension is installed into Firefox's installation directory, you're probably able to either adjust the extension's install.rdf as mentioned above or to remove it during the deployment so that your users don't get the incompatibility warning.

Comment 7

[Florian Effenberger]

Thanks Simon, will test that!

Comment 8

[Florian Effenberger]

In my deployment, I just copied a modified install.rdf file. This seems to work.

Comment 9

[Simon Bünzli]

*** Bug 364469 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 10

[aghper]

(In reply to comment #9)
> *** Bug 364469 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
> 
oops my mistake I did search just to see if someone else had the same problem I did not see.sorry.what this means now,I was able to visit pages which uses java and no problem?do I uninstall java and install old version?

Comment 11

[Simon Bünzli]

(In reply to comment #10)
> do I uninstall java and install old version?

No need to do that, Java is working fine. What's marked as incompatible and disabled is only the extension shipped with Java 6 which adds a menu item "Java Console" to the Tools menu.

So unless you are a developer and use the Java Console on a regular basis, this shouldn't affect you at all.

Comment 12

[aghper]

(In reply to comment #11)
> (In reply to comment #10)
> > do I uninstall java and install old version?
> 
> No need to do that, Java is working fine. What's marked as incompatible and
> disabled is only the extension shipped with Java 6 which adds a menu item "Java
> Console" to the Tools menu.
> 
> So unless you are a developer and use the Java Console on a regular basis, this
> shouldn't affect you at all.
> 

thank you very much for taking the time and answering my question.

Comment 16

[Alfred Peng]

Danielle, could you please take a look at this bug?

Comment 17

[Florian Effenberger]

Maybe fixed with J2SE 6.0 Update 1

Comment 18

[danielle.pham]

This has been fixed in 6.0 update 2.

Comment 19

[danielle.pham]

(See Sun bug id 6506635)

Comment 24

[christian]

hi, i have the same problem with java, when the firefox update finished, i had a message saying that java isn t compatible. so i went in "C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox"), go to the
"extensions" subfolder and there the subfolder not starting with "{972ce...", i opened the rdf file with a word pad, but no "20.0" to change in "2.0.0*"
thx

Comment 25

[christian]

hi, i have the same problem with java, when the firefox update finished, i had a message saying that java isn t compatible. so i went in "C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox"), go to the
"extensions" subfolder and there the subfolder not starting with "{972ce...", i opened the rdf file with a word pad, but no "20.0" to change in "2.0.0*"
thx

Comment 26

[John O'Duinn [:joduinn] (please use "needinfo?" flag)]

I was able to reproduce this problem on my WinXP machine when FF auto-updated from FF2003 -> FF2004... and in the process disabled my JavaConsole6.0.01. 

There was a claim above that this J2SE6.0.01 compatibility problem was fixed in J2SE6update2. However, I couldnt find J2SE6.0.02 on the java.sun.com site. As far as I can tell, J2SE6.0.02 is not yet available. Instead I found a nightly build of J2SE6u2 on http://download.java.net/jdk6/binaries/jdk-6u2-ea-bin-b02-windows-i586-p-12_apr_2007.exe. 

Installing that did the trick for me, and I now have a working Java Console using a nighty build of J2SE6.0.02 running with FF2.0.0.4. 

Hope that helps...

Comment 27

[danielle.pham]

Everyone,
As mentioned in earlier post on May/15, this problem has been fixed in 6.0u2 (Sun bug ID: 6506635)

6u1 is currently still the official latest update on java.com.
However, in the interim waiting for 6u2 official, please refer to Johon O'Duinn post above for link to download nightly of 6u2, to overcome this problem in your testing.
http://download.java.net/jdk6/binaries/jdk-6u2-ea-bin-b02-windows-i586-p-12_apr_2007.exe

Comment 29

[Anna Welsford]

Just to let you know that this does NOT work correctly. I have an application running on my computer called Quotestream and this does NOT work in firefox since the new update, works in IE fine but firefox spits its dunny out over it.

To give you a bit of background...its a streaming data tool...for stock prices...the streaming prices are not coming through nor is the level 2 information (market makers order books) but other parts are streaming fine.

Comment 30

[danielle.pham]

Hi Anna,
This bug is on Java Console extension only.
If you think problem is Sun Java related only, please go to http://bugs.sun.com/bugdatabase/index.jsp to submit a bug.
Please be sure to provide:
- OS version, JRE version, FF version.
- Copy of testcase or URL where the problem seen with your streaming data tool can be reproduced.
- Level 5 Java traces (from Java Console).

Comment 32

[Simon Bünzli]

This has been fixed for Java SE 6.0 Update 2 which has been recently released. maxVersion has now been set to 5.0+ which should be fine for the years to come (from a user's POV anyway).