Thursday, January 17, 2013

the Java crisis

is a bit overrated. It’s been in the news because originally Sun said that would not fix the problem. The announcement was a way to embarrass them into action. Update 7.11 has now been released and is ready for installation. However, it’s not quite as simple as it seems.

1. The installation has checked by default your acceptance to also install the ASK Toolbar. It’s a search engine toolbar for your browser and is not needed and generally considered junk software.

2. Older versions of Java are not uninstalled during the update. So the previous flawed versions still remain on your computer leaving you vulnerable to the exploit even after you install the fixed version. In fact you might find that many older versions of Java are installed on your computer and need to be removed.

3. Websites often require a specific version of Java to work. This is actually the reason why the software doesn’t remove the older versions of itself. So we may find that this new version of Java will actually cause a problem with websites that you depend upon because the website itself has not been updated yet.

So the plan is to update Java on your computers as we visit them. We also be uninstalling the older versions at the same time. We will not know if all of the websites you visit are compatible with the new version until you visit those sites. So we’ll require your cooperation and patience to get through this.

-Amy

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