Installing Firefox 2 and Java 6 on AIX 5.3

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A trial-and-error approach indicates that when Firefox is used to manage HMC 7.3.x.x Java 6 is needed to open a terminal. If Java version 5 or lower is used, the terminal will refuse to open. In order for Java 6 to be installed on AIX version 5.3.7.x or higher is required.

This wiki article is to form a step-by-step guide to install Firefox with Java 6 on AIX:

Contents

[edit] Step 1 - check the TechLevel:

In order to install Java 6 on AIX, the techlevel needs to be at at least at level 7. In this example an AIX version 5.3 with techlevel 9 is used, as this is the latest version available on the IBM website at the time of writing.

Note: Java 6 requires no extra updates to run on AIX version 6.

To view the current OS level used type: 

oslevel -s

Note: the response has to be at least: 5300-07-00-0000, in our case the response is 5300-09-02-0849

[edit] Step 2 - Installing Java 6:

Java 6 can be downloaded as an RPM from the IBM website

RPM's can be installed using: 

smitty installp

[edit] Step 3 - Install Dependencies

After Java 6 has been installed the following dependencies need to be installed:

  • expat-1.95.7
  • fontconfig-2.2.2
  • freetype2-2.1.7
  • libpng-1.2.8
  • xrender-0.8.4
  • gettext-0.10.40
  • libjpeg-6b
  • libtiff-3.6.1
  • glib2-2.8.1
  • xcursor-1.0.2
  • xft-2.1.6
  • atk-1.10.3
  • cairo-1.0.2
  • pango-1.10.0
  • gtk2-2.8.3

RPM’s of all these packages are available from the IBM website, or the Linux toolbox for applications CD.

[edit] Step 4 - Install Firefox

The system is now ready to install Firefox 2 base installation.

The Firefox 2 RPM can be downloaded from the IBM website

Again, the RPM can be installed using 
smitty installp
.

Now that everything has been installed a symlink to the Java 6 plugin as to be created in order for Firefox to locate it. 

ln –s /usr/java6_64/jre/plugin/ppc64/ns7/libjavaplugin_oji.so /usr/mozilla/firefox/plugins/libjavaplugin_oji.so

Note: it is possible that the libjavaplugin_oji.so file is located somewhere else, be sure to first issue a find (find / -name libjavaplugin_oji.so) to ensure you have the right file.

After executing the command listed above the symlink should be available in Firefox 2.

[edit] Additional settings

Note: X11 Forwarding has to be configured in the sshd_config file if you're going to use Firefox through a ssh client (like PuTTY). The configuration file can be found in: /etc/ssh/sshd_config.

Adjust the following settings (by removing the "#"): 

AllowTcpForwarding yes
X11Forwarding yes
X11DisplayOffset 10
X11UseLocalhost yes

Add the following line to the file: 

XAuthLocation /usr/bin/X11/xauth

After this, restart sshd using: 

stopsrc -s sshd
startsrc -s sshd

In order for the script to be activated it is necissary to log out ang log back to the server if a ssh shell is used.

Congratulations! You now should have Firefox 2 with Java 6... have fun!

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