The Blackdown Java-Linux Team is happy to announce the availability
the Java 2 Standard Edition v1.4.1-01 for Linux on ix86 and SPARC.

Please choose one of our FTP mirrors for downloading:
http://www.blackdown.org/java-linux/mirrors.html

Currently the SDK and the Runtime Environment are available as
self-extracting .tar.bz2 files only.  Debian packages should be
available soon.

Both the ix86 and the SPARC version include the HotSpot Client and
Server VMs, as well as an enhanced version of Java Web Start 1.2.0_01
and a Java Plug-In for browsers based on Mozilla.  The ix86 version
also includes a Java Plug-In for Netscape 4.x browsers.

Installation instructions are available from
http://www.blackdown.org/java-linux/java2-status/INSTALL-1.4-j2sdk
and
http://www.blackdown.org/java-linux/java2-status/INSTALL-1.4-j2re


Changes from 1.4.1-beta:
========================

* Improved graphics/imaging performance (up to 80% for some operations)
* Improved volatiles performance (especially in the Server VM)
* Fixed SSE2 memory barriers to get volatiles semantics correctly
* Support kernels with custom PAGE_OFFSETs (needed for some x86 kernels
  and the default kernel for x86-64)
* Fixed handling of stack overflows on the main thread for kernels
  with enabled heap-stack-gap (e.g. SuSE kernels)
* Complete LFS support
* Improved MappedByteBuffer implementation
* Support depth 24 display with 24 frame buffer bits per pixel
* Replaced some functions with thread safe equivalents
* Various small bug fixes
* Upgrade to Sun patch level 1.4.1_01


Java Web Start Notes:
====================

The bundled version of Java Web Start can generate desktop icons and
menu entries for both GNOME and KDE.  The behavior can be customized
on the 'Shortcut Options' tab in the preferences panel.

Currently Java Web Start only gets registered automatically for
Netscape 4.x.  For other browsers you will have to register the
application/x-java-jnlp-file MIME type manually in the browser's or
the desktop environment's configuration.  We are trying to automate
this process for future releases.

Please note that Java Web Start has only been tested in per-user
installations so far.


Notes for ix86 Version:
======================

The ix86 Version is available in two flavors: One built with
gcc-2.95.4 and one built with gcc-3.2.1.  (Once most distributions
build Mozilla with gcc-3.2 or newer we will stop making gcc-2.95
builds.)

* Requirements
    - i586 compatible system
    - glibc-2.2.5 or newer
    - kernel 2.4.18 or newer
    - XFree 4.1 or newer
    - libstdc++ from gcc-3.2 or newer (only needed for the gcc-3.2 Java build)
    - Mozilla 1.0 or newer built with gcc-2.95 or gcc-3.2 depending
      on which Java build you use (needed only for the Java Plug-In)
      

Notes for the SPARC Version:
===========================

For SPARC only a gcc-3.2.1 based build is available.

* Requirements:
    - v9 architecture (v8 should work but has not been test, v7 is not
      supported)
    - glibc-2.2.5 or newer
    - kernel 2.4.18 or newer
    - XFree 4.1 or newer
    - libstdc++ from gcc-3.2 or newer
    - Mozilla 1.0 or newer built with gcc-3.2 or newer (needed only
      for the Java Plug-In)

* Sound limitations: 
    - Only built-in sound devices are supported in this release
      (PC-style PCI sound cards are not supported)
    - Recording is not supported yet (it might work but it is untested
      due to kernel problems)



        Blackdown Java-Linux Team