Re: working with liveconnect

Hello,

I'm very new to LiveConnect and even Java, but I had some experience 
with this as I tried to harness Java software in my XML-related extensions.

The problems got worse with FF3 (though I remember reading somewhere 
that there were plans to fix it?). I forget exactly which of these bugs 
are only in FF3, but, these are the ones I encountered and reported...

1) The string issue you refer to: 
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=417706
2) Try-catch: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=391642
3) Since FF3: Arrays: 
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=434658 (has a viable 
workaround)

One issue to watch out for specifically on the Mac btw is its lack of 
support for Java 6 (not FF's fault).

John Resig mentions the string issue as if it were going to be a new 
feature at slide 18 of 
http://www.slideshare.net/jeresig/the-future-of-firefox-and-javascript/  
in Rhino, though I understand Spidermonkey is what FF uses instead of 
Rhino. But anyways, while I could be wrong, I really thought I had 
java.lang.String working earlier, and regardless, I don't see why it 
shouldn't work since LiveConnect is supposed to be able to do that kind 
of thing.

The try-catch issue is a very serious issue for working with LiveConnect 
since the only workaround is to catch the exceptions in the Java code 
(which makes it hard when you're using others' libraries) and return the 
error string (which can also require a change in the return type of the 
method).

As you'll notice, there's been no response on any of these bugs so far, 
so we'll see what happens... Would be great if someone in the know could 
shed some light on us here...Sorry I don't know more...

best wishes,
Brett


[email protected] wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I'm working on a firefox extension that needs to use java classes and
> requires communication both ways between java and ff.  So liveconnect
> seems to be the way to go from what I'm reading.
>
> However I'm trying to write just a very basic javascript file that
> declares a java string (like in the tutorials) and it doesn't appear
> to be running properly.  I'm pretty sure it is firefox and not my
> javascript because I've run a number of liveconnect tests I've found
> online and am getting inconsistent results.
>
> For example I attempted the test found here: http://srp.stanford.edu/demo/
> and it does not succeed.
>
> neither does this test:
> http://developer.apple.com/internet/safari/samples/ColorBlockApplet.html
>
> I'm running Firefox 2.0.0.14 on a mac (perhaps this is a mac specific
> problem?).  Is there any sort of setup procedure that I can do for
> liveconnect - or should it work inherently in the browser?
>
> thanks a lot,
> pat
>