

So on Ubuntu 18.04, we have to unset both GNOME_DESKTOP_SESSION_ID and XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP before starting javaws with Java 11. This change appears to be “backported” to Java 11 (but not Java 8). The solution the JDK developers went for is to start checking the XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP variable as well. The issue is discussed in detail here on Github. This environmental variable was deprecated earlier and now this got removed in the latest version Java relies on an environment variable GNOME_DESKTOP_SESSION_ID for getting GTK desktop theme. Previously, by unsetting the environment variable GNOME_DESKTOP_SESSION_ID, we could prevent the client from detecting GTK.īut since the latest openJDK 11 version, there is now a different way in which it detects GTK: If Gnome / GTK is detected, it changes its “Look and feel” of the FFB client: widgets, creating the white bar below, and uses a different font. It turns out that Java tries to detect whether it is on a Gnome / GTK system. In Ubuntu 20.04LTS, this variable is not even present anymore. GNOME_DESKTOP_SESSION_ID=this-is-deprecated However, since the latest openjdk-11, this stopped working, forcing me to look into it. What is up with GNOME_DESKTOP_SESSION_ID?Įver since I first started playing online Blood Bowl using the FFB client on Ubuntu, I just did the unset -v GNOME_DESKTOP_SESSION_ID trick and started playing. Icedtea is available for both OpenJDK 8 and OpenJDK 11, so no problem there. IcedTea-Web provides an independent open source implementation of Java Web Start that is currently developed by the AdoptOpenJDK community, RedHat and Karakun AG, and which is bundled in the official OpenJDK installer.
Openjdk java 8 code#
The code for Java Web Start was not released by Oracle as part of OpenJDK, and thus OpenJDK originally did not support it. It was deprecated by Oracle in Java SE 9 and removed in Java SE 11.

Java Web Start was distributed as part of the Java Platform, and included in downloads of the JRE and JDK.
Openjdk java 8 install#
Which is nice, since Java 11 is currently the default Java version for Ubuntu, and we do not have to install additional software to run the FFB client.įinally, there is the web start technology: Indeed, my own experience is that the FFB client can also be run with Java 11. Since our goal is to keep on using a Java app written for Java 8, we focus on 8 and 11 for the rest of this post.Ĭan apps written for Java 8 also be run in a Java 11 environment? In a Medium blog post on migrating from Java 8 to Java 11 it is mentioned that Java is famous for its backward compatibility. In the Java champions medium article mentioned above, a nice table is shown with all the different versions and how long they will be supported by the community. Why? Because 8 and 11 are on “Long term support” (LTS), and 17 is the most recent Java version (and also destined to be a LTS version). Of all these versions only 8, 11 and 17 are relevant. There is 8, but also, 9, 10, 11 etc up to 17. I also learned about the different versions of Java.

We can see that the bug fixes point to where the bugs are fixed in all affected versions, including openjdk 8. The release notes for the latest Oracle Java 8 version (8u311) can be found here. However, from the current state of affairs, written up here by the Java Champions, I gather that both Oracle Java 8 and OpenJDK 8 come from the same codebase maintained at and that differences are mostly in packaging & support. The FFB client is designed to work well with “Oracle Java 8 from ”, see e.g.
