java setup for linux/unix

Many linux distributions (such as debian) do not ship with a working out-of-the box java runtime environment due to licensing issues. unless otherwise indicated by your sysad, you'll want to set one up like so:

Download the java runtime environment (1.4 or higher required, in this case, we take jre-1_5_0_07-linux-i586.bin) e.g. from http://www.java.com/de/download/manual.jsp

chmod 744 jre-1_5_0_07-linux-i586.bin

Go to directory where java should live

./jre-1_5_0_07-linux-i586.bin

you will probably need to set the following environment variables

(using tcsh):

setenv PATH /where_you_installed_java_to/jre1.5.0_07/bin/:$PATH
setenv JAVA  /where_you_installed_java_to/jre1.5.0_07/bin/java
setenv JAVA_OPTIONS "-Xmx500m"

(for bash):

export PATH=/where_you_installed_java_to/jre1.5.0_07/bin/:$PATH
export JAVA=/where_you_installed_java_to/jre1.5.0_07/bin/java
export JAVA_OPTIONS="-Xmx500m"

getting started with esra

1. download the current release.

2. add the classes to your java environment

export CLASSPATH=/path/to/esra.jar:$CLASSPATH

3. go to the ScriptRepository and start scripting.

javadoc

browse a reasonably current version of the javadocs.

Developers: please keep these docs current by running

rsync -r /path/to/workspace/esra/doc/ user@esra.sf.net:/home/groups/e/es/esra/htdocs/doc/versionNumber

if you update the sources.

creating binaries

it seems like the mono-project not only supports java and python, but also ahead-of-time compilation (see, e.g. http://www.mono-project.org/Java). investigations and benchmarks would be welcome.