JDK 1.5.0_05 won't load applets from the Internet?

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thomas_okken@hotmail.com - 30 Oct 2005 20:08 GMT

I'm setting up a new PC with a brand-new installation of Windows XP and
Fedora Core 3 (each with all the latest updates).
I'm having trouble with the Java plug-in: it won't load any applets
from the Internet (from the local filesystem works fine). I'm behind a
SOCKS v4 proxy; the browsers and DNS are configures appropriately and
surfing the net works fine, using Mozilla and IE under Windows and
using Mozilla under Linux -- but trying to load a page with an applet
just displays the pretty coffee mug image where the applet should be,
and when I try to leave the page, the browser hangs, presumably because
the JVM is stuck trying to download the applet.
I tried reconfiguring the gateway to use plain NAT, so I could take the
proxy out of the picture, but this did not fix things.

I never had problems like these with JDK 1.4.2.*, but with 1.5.0_05, I
just can't get it to work at all. Web Start doesn't work either -- just
sits there "checking for latest version" indefinitely.

I have Java configured to use the browser's settings; configuring the
proxy settings manually makes no difference. (Of course when I use NAT
on the gateway, there is no proxy involved at all, but that does not
work either.)

N.B. The applets themselves do not appear to be the problem -- I tried
some really simple ones, including samples from the Java Tutorial;
nothing even gets pulled across the network.

I'm hoping someone can shed some light on this -- I'm stumped!
Thanks,

- Thomas

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Andrew Thompson - 31 Oct 2005 05:02 GMT

> I'm setting up a new PC with a brand-new installation of Windows XP and
> Fedora Core 3 (each with all the latest updates).

Try it on an IE without SP2. Service Pack 2 seemed to have
a few little 'gotchas' for Java - built in free.

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Andrey Kuznetsov - 31 Oct 2005 06:45 GMT

>> I'm setting up a new PC with a brand-new installation of Windows XP and
>> Fedora Core 3 (each with all the latest updates).
>
> Try it on an IE without SP2. Service Pack 2 seemed to have
> a few little 'gotchas' for Java - built in free.

try it on Firefox

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Andrey Kuznetsov
http://uio.imagero.com Unified I/O for Java
http://reader.imagero.com Java image reader
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Roedy Green - 31 Oct 2005 09:56 GMT

On Mon, 31 Oct 2005 04:02:34 GMT, Andrew Thompson
<seemysites@www.invalid> wrote, quoted or indirectly quoted someone
who said :

>Try it on an IE without SP2. Service Pack 2 seemed to have
>a few little 'gotchas' for Java - built in free.

In the old days there was a saying "DOS isn't done until Lotus [Lotus
123 spreadsheet] won't run".

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Canadian Mind Products, Roedy Green.
http://mindprod.com Java custom programming, consulting and coaching.

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Andrew Thompson - 31 Oct 2005 10:22 GMT

> On Mon, 31 Oct 2005 04:02:34 GMT, Andrew Thompson
> <seemysites@www.invalid> wrote, quoted or indirectly quoted someone
[quoted text clipped - 5 lines]
> In the old days there was a saying "DOS isn't done until Lotus [Lotus
> 123 spreadsheet] won't run".

Yes.. I recall that assertion whenever dealing with
IE/Java problems. I wish MS programmers would employ
the obvious cleverness they have, for purposes of *good*.

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Nigel Wade - 31 Oct 2005 11:30 GMT

> I'm setting up a new PC with a brand-new installation of Windows XP and
> Fedora Core 3 (each with all the latest updates).
[quoted text clipped - 26 lines]
>
> - Thomas

Has some overzealous, paranoid, network security admin put a content scanning
firewall in place which blocks applets?

Some security admins believe the FUD from Microsoft that Java applets are
insecure and should be blocked (while at the same time allowing ActiveX, IM and
all the rest of the completely insecure MS traffic).

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Nigel Wade, System Administrator, Space Plasma Physics Group,
University of Leicester, Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK
E-mail : nmw@ion.le.ac.uk
Phone : +44 (0)116 2523548, Fax : +44 (0)116 2523555

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Roedy Green - 31 Oct 2005 11:47 GMT

>Has some overzealous, paranoid, network security admin put a content scanning
>firewall in place which blocks applets?

From some other machine, check out the server to make sure it is
serving the correct MIME types for all the relevant files.

See http://mindprod.com/applets/mimecheck.html

Perhaps the firewall is doing some check on HTTP and insisting on a
set of "good" MIMES.

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Canadian Mind Products, Roedy Green.
http://mindprod.com Java custom programming, consulting and coaching.

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thomas_okken@hotmail.com - 31 Oct 2005 22:50 GMT

I tried several different MIME types from a local web server (no proxy
in those tests) and it made no difference, neither with Mozilla nor IE.
I doubt that it affects the proxy because with the right combination of
browser and JRE, I _can_ in fact get the applet to load.

To isolate the Java version issue, I compared JRE 1.4.2_10 to 1.5.0_05,
first on a Windows 2000 (sp4) box running IE 6.0.2800.1106 and Mozilla
1.7.7, and then on my new Windows XP (sp2) box running IE
6.0.2900.2180.xpsp_sp2_gdr.050301-1519 (I am not making this up) and
Mozilla 1.7.12. All tests were done behind the same proxy (a Windows
2000 machine running VSOCKS Light 0.23a).

On the Windows 2000 using JRE 1.4.2_10, the applet loaded and ran fine
in IE; it did not load in Mozilla -- the Java console showed a timeout
occurring while opening a network connection. Running the tests with
JRE 1.5.0_05, neither browser opened the applet successfully; in fact,
both hang, nothing appears in the Java console, and the browser
processes have to be killed forcefully.

On the Windows XP box, the results were identical. Also, I tried
Mozilla on Linux; with 1.4.2_10, it doesn't work at all because it
won't pick up the browser's proxy settings, and you can't manually
configure a SOCKS proxy in this version of the JRE; with 1.5.0_05, it
hangs (or more precisely, the java_vm process hangs and the browser
hangs with it).

So, Mozilla is 0 for 6 in those tests; IE is 2 for 2 with JRE 1.4.2_10
and 0 for 2 with JRE 1.5.0_05. IE does not appear to be the problem.
Presumably the proxy is the culprit, but then why does IE plus Java 1.4
work fine?

I should run some more tests using plain NAT. I suppose. Stay tuned...

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thomas_okken@hotmail.com - 31 Oct 2005 23:11 GMT

I tried several different MIME types from a local web server (no proxy
in those tests) and it made no difference, neither with Mozilla nor IE.
I doubt that it affects the proxy because with the right combination of
browser and JRE, I _can_ in fact get the applet to load.

To isolate the Java version issue, I compared JRE 1.4.2_10 to 1.5.0_05,
first on a Windows 2000 (sp4) box running IE 6.0.2800.1106 and Mozilla
1.7.7, and then on my new Windows XP (sp2) box running IE
6.0.2900.2180.xpsp_sp2_gdr.050301-1519 (I am not making this up) and
Mozilla 1.7.12. All tests were done behind the same proxy (a Windows
2000 machine running VSOCKS Light 0.23a).

On the Windows 2000 using JRE 1.4.2_10, the applet loaded and ran fine
in IE; it did not load in Mozilla -- the Java console showed a timeout
occurring while opening a network connection. Running the tests with
JRE 1.5.0_05, neither browser opened the applet successfully; in fact,
both hang, nothing appears in the Java console, and the browser
processes have to be killed forcefully.

The only difference when running the same tests on the XP box was that
now even the IE/Java1.4 combination works any more -- so I guess it's
true M$ broke IE (probably on purpose).

The fact that the Win2000/IE/Java1.4 combination does work suggests to
me that the proxy itself may not be the problem, but some bizarre
combination of factors is preventing the JVM from talking to it
properly.

I guess I should try some more tests with NAT, or maybe look for a free
HTTP proxy or something...

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thomas_okken@hotmail.com - 31 Oct 2005 23:39 GMT

I re-ran my tests with the XP client, and instead of the SOCKS proxy on
the gateway, I now used plain Network Address Translation (NAT) (simply
by turning on Connection Sharing on the Internet connection).

I must have done something wrong when I ran those tests before, because
the results look different -- and a lot better, too: JRE 1.5.0_05 now
works in _both_ IE and Mozilla. JRE 1.4.2_10 works in Mozilla but not
IE -- but who cares, newer is better anyway. ;-)

Now I just need to figure out how to get all this to work with
ZoneAlarm running on the gateway -- VSOCKS Light had no problem but
apparently Connection Sharing does. Oh, well, that's a different topic
altogether.

Thanks all for your help!

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JDK 1.5.0_05 won't load applets from the Internet?

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