Java Plugin with Firefox 3.6 and Chromium (64bit)

Post date: Jan 25, 2010 3:28:36 AM

Java Duke

Why does my Java plugin not work when I update Firefox to 3.6?Previously in Linux, enabling the java plugin was quite simple (if you knew where to find it), you simply put a link to the libjavaplugin_oji.so file into your ~/.mozilla/plugins directory.Restart Firefox and you are good to go!This is assuming you had Java installed. (I have the development kit installed in /opt/jdk directory). So this is what I used to do:

cd ~/.mozilla/plugins

ln -s /opt/jdk/jre/lib/i386/libjavaplugin_oji.so

However, Firefox now requires a link to a different java plugin file - libnpjp2.so

You need to have java 1.6 update 10 or greater for this file to exist.

cd ~/.mozilla/plugins

ln -s /opt/jdk/jre/lib/i386/libnpjp2.so

Once I added this link and restarted, Firefox now has Java Plugin working again.

By the Way...

A 64 bit version of the Sun Java runtime does NOT come with a plugin. You have to use the 32bit version.

I ended up keeping two versions of the JDK for this purpose.

I was wrong... the latest Versions of Java do have a 64 bit plugin!!! (I am currently running Java 1.6.0_18)

Use it with a 64-bit firefox build.

cd /usr/lib/firefox/plugins

sudo ln -s /opt/jdk/jre/lib/amd64/libnpjp2.so

(or wherever your java is installed)

This also enables it in the 64-bit version of chromium!

I am running Ubuntu 9.1 amd64 version (on an Intel i7) so I get the chromium-daily 64-bit builds from http://ppa.launchpad.net/chromium-daily/ppa/ubuntu karmic main

See their page for further instructions.