How to install or upgrade Java in Linux

These are my notes on how to install or update Java on a Linux server. In this how to, I will be using the Java from Oracle and not the operating systems or distros repository. You can download and install either a rpm or a tar file, from Oracle's site.

When using the Java provided on Oracle's website, they give you a choice of downloading rpm or tar file.

You can download Java here.
http://www.java.com/en/download/linux_manual.jsp

Installing Java with using RPM

Find the current version of Java on the system.

root@earth> find / -name java -type f
/usr/java/jre1.7.0_55/bin/java

Note If you use which or java -version commands to find Java on you system. This will only show your the system's main java. You may have additional versions installed.

Now take each line of output and paste it at the end of this command. This gives you the name of the rpm package that installed this file and version of Java.

root@earth> rpm -qf    /usr/java/jre1.7.0_55/bin/java
jre-1.7.0_55-fcs

Uninstall the old package.

root@earth> rpm -e  jre-1.7.0_55-fcs

Note- Do not run the above command for java that is part of an application. If the file was in /usr/bin/ you should be fine.

Install Java

root@earth> rpm  -ivh    jre-7u65-linux-x64.rpm

You can alternately upgrade Java instead.

root@earth> rmp   -Uvh    jre-7u65-linux-x64.rpm

Install Java using a tar file
Change directory to where Java is going to be installed. Usually it will be /user/java.

root@earth> cd  /usr/java

Move the tar file to /usr/java.

Unpack the tarball and install Java

root@earth> tar  zxvf   jre-7u65-linux-i586.tar.gz

Delete the tar file after you test Java and your done.

Reference:
Java.com

Related posts on this Blog
How to install Java 7 & 8 on Solaris
Access the Java Control Panel
Updating Java on Solaris