I just installed FC8 on a second partition on my desktop and it came with the 1.7.0 Iced Tea version of Java pre-installed... I ended up going to Java.com and downloading the new 1.6 JRE and installed it line for line from the websites instructions.

Now my issue is the fact that my school runs Cisco Clean Access which I need to log into via Firefox which it uses a Java applet...

With Iced Tea it isn't working hence the reason for me to download the JRE 1.6 from java.com. I installed the 1.6 JRE from Java.com using the instructions given from the website.

I then tried to remove IcedTea 1.7.0 using Yum but since I don't have the internet (since I can't log into Cisco Clean Access), it can't go into the repository and ultimately remove IcedTea.

Is there any way around this so I can get the selected java to use the JRE 1.6 instead of IcedTea 1.7.0?

Please let me know,
Thanks in advance

Hello and welcome to LQ.

You could check in /usr/lib/firefox/plugins and /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins directories for a symlink to Iced Tea Java plugin and replace that symlink to 1.6 version.

You will also make sure the JAVA directory, JAVA Class, and JAVA Library environment variable is set.

How exactly do I check to see if the JAVA directory, class and environment is set? I'm not sure if this has anything to do with it but I know currently when I type java -version in the terminal it comes up as being set to Iced tea...

echo $JAVA_HOME for the first

or

env | grep -i java

You need to be root in order to echo $JAVA_HOME. And bear in mind that the plug-in still does not work with 64 browsers.

In order to switch java, you'd have to use update-alternatives. There is also a GUI available that can help in doing this (galternatives).

That is not true. Any user can echo and change environment variables, but they can only change what is theirs. Also JAVA could be re-compile for 64-bit or download the 64-bit pre-compiled version of JAVA.

That may be how it works on Gentoo but there are quite a few other distros that will nothing but a blank line if your JAVA_HOME isn't set in your home directory. And recompiling a jdk or a jre isn't a problem but if it really were that simple to get a functional 64 bit plug-in, why isn't one there one available yet? People have been requesting one from Sun for ages.

I care less about 64-bit programs unless I am dealing with multimedia. Running a 32-bit Java bytecode on a 64-bit JAVA VM can have a lot of memory and IO conversion problems. Probably a wrapper or two separate modes have to be setup in the 64-bit JAVA VM. Also have you seen a 64-bit Flash player from Adobe.

Not all maintainers do it right. An RPM and DEB file does not have strict rules of doing things. RPM files are the worst and you have to depend on the maintainer to do it correctly. They may not change the main file that sets the environment globally. Gentoo uses a utility named eselect to ease selection of different JAVA and JAVA plug-in installs.