210349 - The only java plugin working for me is blackdown's 1.4.1. (Both sun's ans IBM are not seen) Problem also with the java debugger

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 209834

(Core Graveyard :: Plug-ins, defect)

Description

[Giampaolo Gallo]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20030617
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 1.4rc2

If I try to configure mozilla with java plugins other than blackdown's 1.4.1 
Mozilla 1.4rc2 behaves as the plugin is not installed. (Blackdown's 1.4.1 plugin
does not work with mozilla versions before 1.4rc2). Moreover if I try a
debugging session of an applet running under mozilla there is no way to connect.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.
2.
3.

Comment 1

[Frederic Bezies]

For Sun, you *have* to use JRE 1.4.2beta.

This is written in release notes. Did you read them ?

Comment 2

[Giampaolo Gallo]

I'm sorry, I haven't read this. In the release page http://www.mozilla.org/releases/ 
there is a reference to jdk1.4.1 or windows or Solaris. There is also a reference to 
Macintosh but none to Linux. So I  thought everything was fine with Linux.  
In any case what are the reasons for such a limit? 
If I want to try different jre under mozilla I will not be able to do it under mozilla 1.4. 

Comment 3

[Frederic Bezies]

The info is written in "additionnal notes" :

http://www.mozilla.org/releases/mozilla1.4rc2/#new-issues

"Mozilla 1.4 for Linux requires Sun J2SE v 1.4.2 Beta to run Java applets"

Technically speaking (I am not a coder, sorry for hard coders which should read
this), there is some kind of incompatibility between code created with gcc 2.95
(JRE 1.4.1 is in this case), and Mozilla 1.4rc builds, which are now gcc 3.2.3
based.

You can use BlackDown JRE *only* if you download the gcc 3.2 based version.

Hope it helps :-]

Comment 4

[Giampaolo Gallo]

Many thanks for your kind answer.  
I apologize again for not having read the release notes. 
 

Comment 5

[Matthias Versen [:Matti]]

-> invalid

Comment 6

[Milton Maldonado Junior]

Sorry people, but this is indeed a bug. Mozilla doesn't see the Java plug-in and
asks the user to download it from Netscape.com. Won't work.

I'm aware of the release notes stating that a specific version of the Java
should be used but, hey, such a release note is a WORKAROUND, NOT NEARLY A
BUGFIX! Go tell a non-developer he was dumb because he hadn't read the release
notes, and he will send you to hell...

My suggestion is to make Mozilla detect the Java plugin version and inform the
user appropriately if there's a version mismatch. User friendliness anyone???

Comment 7

[Chris Spencer]

No mr know-it-all, it is not a bug. What you fail to realize is the binary
incompatibility with GCC 2.95 and GCC 3.2. GCC 3.2 compiled programs do not
recognize 2.9.5 libraries, and vice versa. It has nothing to do with Mozilla.
That's why more recent distos ship with Java (that they compiled with GCC 3.2 or
3.3), to avoid such problems.

Comment 8

[Milton Maldonado Junior]

Hey Chris, I know the binary compatibility problem from some time (from when
I've installed Slackware 9.0 - GCC 3.2) and I know it's not techically a Mozilla
fault, okay. But the point I want to stress is that Joe User is not expected to
understand this, nor to read release notes. RTFM is a golden rule for techies,
but Joe couldn't care less. 

Furthermore, the fact that Mozilla fetches the Netscape Plug-in repository is
misleading in this case, since the Netscape's Java plug-in is known not to work.
 Is this not a bug? In this sense the release notes brought to my mind the
famous "Hey Marty, don't use the amplifier, it has a slight chance of
overloading" after Marty used the amplifier and it exploded. Marty was a Joe User.

You have a good point regarding the Linux distros, they can solve this problem
for Joe. But relying on the competence of the distro makers looks like letting a
work deliberately unfinished.

I never said that Mozilla should work with the old plug-in, I've just said that
Mozilla should avoid it in the first place, and recommend a compatible one.
Unless it's very hard to afford, a thing that doesn't even worth a try, I'll
keep my point.

I'm sorry you've taken my post as a troll. I'm just another Mozilla
enthusiast/advocate and I admire the project and the people that make it. What
made me angry is that there is a known, severe bug, that is being left behind, a
fact that doesn't match the overall Mozilla's quality.

Best regards.

Comment 9

[Bill Mason]

Reopening to dup the bug.

Comment 10

[Bill Mason]

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 209834 ***