Sun’s Lack of a Java Plug-In for x86_64
Every now and then I give a look-see to Sun's Java web site to see if they have stated when they'll start to deliver a Java plug-in for x86_64. There's a bug report on Sun's web site, with a ton of comments blasting Sun for not getting a x86_64 64-bit plug-in working, saying that this is addressed in JDK 1.7 (Dolphin). I took this for a good sign as I went to the Java web site to see if there was a beta of JDK 1.7 available - and there was.
So I downloaded it and looked inside the jre directory to see that no plugin exists. It's amazing. They say they're going to have it, but then they don't follow-up and actually deliver it. Now, it's possible, I suppose, that this is going to be added in the final release, but I'm guessing not, as that would mean that something is in the final release that was not in a beta release - not very likely.
So I decided to see if this Blackdown 64-bit java plug-in would work, knowing that it was stopped at JDK 1.4.2. Interestingly, their site, http://www.blackdown.org/ comes back with nothing in the web page. I've googled for this site, and it keeps pointing me back to this empty page. There are several sites like this that tell you how to install it, but all their links to download it are pointing to bogus sites. I finally found a page saying that Blockdown is no more. That explains it. I did find a mirror site that had it still, but when I tried it with my FC5 box and BonEcho 2.0.0.3, it crashed. Too bad.
Well... I guess I'll have to wait for Sun to decide that 64-bit desktops are important enough to support. Thankfully, my laptop will have it with the new version of Mac OS X (10.5) due out this month. Good thing I don't have to wait for Sun for that.