613840 - Java applets stopped working in FF 3.6

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 504397

(Plugins Graveyard :: Java (Java Embedding Plugin), defect)

Description

[Allan Schweitz]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.6; en-US; rv:1.9.2.12) Gecko/20101026 Firefox/3.6.12
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.6; en-US; rv:1.9.2.12) Gecko/20101026 Firefox/3.6.12

After upgrading to FF 3.6 Java applets stopped working. They are not rendered at all and no error message is displayed. The Java plug-in is enabled and the applets work fine in Safary.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Browse to http://java.sun.com/applets/jdk/1.4/index.html
2. Click on any demo link
3. Applet not working/displayed
Actual Results:  
Applet not working/rendered/displayed.

Expected Results:  
Applet rendered and working.

Comment 1

[Matthias Versen [:Matti]]

bug 606739 or bug 606739 ?

Comment 2

[Steven Michaud [:smichaud] (Retired)]

Needless to say, I can't reproduce this.

Note, though, that the page http://java.sun.com/applets/jdk/1.4/index.html is sometimes hard to reach (the browser times out without ever displaying the page).

> bug 606739 or bug 606739 ?

No.  The examples in those bugs use LiveConnect, and should be fixed by my patch for bug 610525 (landed on 2010-11-15, and available in branch nightlies dated 2010-11-16 or later).

None of the examples at http://java.sun.com/applets/jdk/1.4/index.html use LiveConnect.

Comment 3

[Steven Michaud [:smichaud] (Retired)]

Reporter, please go to "about:plugins" and tell us what you see.

If you can, please attach a screenshot.

Comment 4

[Steven Michaud [:smichaud] (Retired)]

> If you can, please attach a screenshot.

Actually, the about:plugins display is sometimes more than one page long, so you may need more than one screenshot.

Comment 5

[Allan Schweitz]

Attachment: about:plugins first bit

Comment 6

[Allan Schweitz]

Attachment: about:plugins second bit

Comment 7

[Allan Schweitz]

Attachment: Screenshot of an example page with applet not working

Comment 8

[Steven Michaud [:smichaud] (Retired)]

There's nothing wrong with the contents of your about:plugins display
save one thing -- JEP 0.9.7.4 should be listed (not JEP 0.9.7.3).  But
this is the result of a known bug, and shouldn't be the source of your
trouble.

By the way, to make JEP 0.9.7.4 visible in about:plugins, delete the
pluginreg.dat file in your profile directory (~/Library/Application
Support/Firefox/Profile/[nnnnnnnn]).

I'm stumped by your problem, so I'll make some generic suggestions:

1) Try downloading a whole new FF 3.6.12 distro.  (The bug I mentioned
   in my first paragraph only happens when you allow the distro to
   update itself.)

2) Try with a fresh profile.

3) By any chance have you changed the soft links under
   /System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework (perhaps to run J2SE
   5.0 or earlier Java versions on OS X 10.6)?  If so this could
   explain your problem.

Comment 9

[Allan Schweitz]

Steven, deleting pluginreg.dat seems to have solved the problem. Everything seems to be working fine now.
Many thanks for your help.

Comment 10

[Steven Michaud [:smichaud] (Retired)]

> Steven, deleting pluginreg.dat seems to have solved the
> problem. Everything seems to be working fine now.

Glad to hear it.

I'm surprised, though, that having wrong information in pluginreg.dat
caused Java applets to stop working.  It's possible this is a new
twist on an old bug -- which I'm grateful to have learned about.  The
"old bug", by the way, is bug 504397, to which I'll dup this bug.

> Many thanks for your help.

You're quite welcome.