Switching J2SE versions on Mac OS (SnowLeopard)

Question

My current JDK on Mac OS (10.6) is set to 1.6 and I'd like to switch to 1.5.

A listing of '/System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/' shows:

lrwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   10 Nov  3 18:34 1.5 -> CurrentJDK
lrwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   10 Nov  3 18:34 1.5.0 -> CurrentJDK
lrwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel    5 Nov  3 18:34 1.6 -> 1.6.0
drwxr-xr-x  8 root  wheel  272 Nov  3 19:54 1.6.0
drwxr-xr-x  9 root  wheel  306 Nov  3 19:54 A
lrwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel    1 Nov  3 18:34 Current -> A
lrwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel    3 Nov  3 18:34 CurrentJDK -> 1.6

Aside from attempting to install 1.5 and then change the symlink for 'CurrentJDK' from 1.6 to 1.5, is there anything else that needs to be done?

Do I also need to change what 'Current' is pointing to? The 'A' directory seems to contain the Headers and the binary executables (javac, jar, etc).

Will another version of the JDK install a second directory for it's version of the executables (hopefully in a separate directory) or are they independent of the JDK version?

FYI: I've run the 'Java Preferences' utility and only Java SE 6 (32 & 64-bit versions) is listed under both 'Java Apple Plugin' and 'Java Applications'

Answer 1

There is no supported means of getting a real 1.5 onto SnowLeopard. There are ways to make it work if you are brave.

See this discussion

The Guts Of The Matter Are Here