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Re: RFC: Java (JAR) desktop integration/admin tool



Hi,

RalfGesellensetter wrote:
> While Java JDK is freed nowadays, those JAR files are mostly 
> closed-source (bluej, javakara, jprologeditor, greenfoot etc.).
> 
> Rather than creating wrapping deb-packages with binary content 
> ('dirty'), I'd suggest a straight-forward policy plus some desktop 
> integration tool for admins:

> RFC:
> - place all jar files to /usr/share/java or /usr/lib/jar

If I understand your mail right, you want to create an application to
manage the JAR files?  If this is right, the *.jar files should IMO go
to /usr/local/lib/java (or somewhere else in /usr/local).

> - register desktop relevant jar files in /etc/debian-desktop-jar.conf
>   like this:
>   [BlueJ]
>   exec="java -jar /usr/lib/jar/bluej22.jar"
>   menu="BlueJ Java Editor"
>   icon=/usr/share/icons/misc/bluej.png
>   ...

These could then be dropped in /usr/local/share/applications.  This
would also solve the next point (at least for desktops that use the
.desktop files).

> - add some hook that makes those icons show in desktop menus
> - provide some tool that helps registering such JAR apps.

I miss something in this approach:  How would the JAR files be
distributed?  And how can updates be handled?  Having the admin install
them manually on multiple systems is not very comfortable and error
prone.

I think it might be a better idea to make it easy to create Debian
packages out of the JAR files (somewhat similar to dh-make-perl for Perl
packages).  This would make it easy to handle distribution and updates
centrally.  Also it gets the added benefit of dependency handling by
APT.

Regards,
Ansgar

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