Unable to debug applet with JDK 7u21 and 7u25

Question

After upgrading my JDK from 7u17 to 7u21 or 7u25, I can no longer debug my applets. I used to set the following parameters to java.exe through Java Control Panel and it worked fine:

-classic -verbose -Xdebug -Xnoagent -Dcom.sun.management.jmxremote -Djavaplugin.classloader.cache.enabled=false -Djava.compiler=NONE -Xrunjdwp:transport=dt_socket,server=y,address=8055,suspend=n

However it's not working with 7u21 and 7u25. With Process Explorer, I see some debug-related parameters are missing in the command line:

"C:\\Java\\jre7\\bin\\java.exe" -Xbootclasspath/a:"C:\\Java\\jre7\\lib\\deploy.jar";"C:\\Java\\jre7\\lib\\javaws.jar";"C:\\Java\\jre7\\lib\\plugin.jar" -Djava.class.path="C:\\Java\\jre7\\classes" -D__jvm_launched=602583525371 -D__applet_launched=602583523886 -Dsun.awt.warmup=true -Xdebug -verbose -Djnlp.packEnabled=false sun.plugin2.main.client.PluginMain write_pipe_name=jpi2_pid10980_pipe9,read_pipe_name=jpi2_pid10980_pipe8

Should I change some parameters or Java settings? Or is this a JDK bug?

Answer 1

I had a LOT of trouble with applets in general with 7u25, and actually uninstalled it and went back to 7u21. It was so bad that I submitted a bug report and Oracle is working on it.

I was able to get a decent amount of debugging with the in-browser Java Consoles by going into the Java Control Panel, clicking the Advanced tab, and enabling pretty much everything I thought might be relevant.