On Windows 7, the JVM interferes with my work by bringing up a UAC prompt at random times when it notices that it needs an update. I can see how this nagging makes sense, so I type in the admin password and expect it to update itself like any other software which does that.
Instead, it only brings up a baloon in the notification area "A new update is available". (Why does it need UAC for that?!) So I click on the symbol to start the update, which immediately brings up a dialog box saying "update has failed" without further explanation.
The whole game repeats from scratch every time I restart the computer. At some point, I give in, log in as administrator, and update from there. But I find the farce unnecessary and nerve-wracking. Is there a way to make the update process easy(ish)? If not Firefox-like easy, then at least Adobe Reader-like easy?
1 Answer
Manual way
This way is to update it in a machine where you have admin privileges and copying the installed java folder (generally in "program files\java\jre6") to your desired computer with common-user privileges.
Then change user environment variable PATH to include the path where you saved the java. Some programs require you to create JAVA_HOME environment variable also pointing to that location. You can optionally change the java location in the programs you use (e.g. OpenOffice), if there is an option for that.
