CACAO FAQ

Features of CACAO

Does CACAO run Java 1.5 bytecode?

Yes.

Building CACAO

configure: error: cannot find ansidecl.h

You need to install the binutils-dev package. (May be binutils-devel, depending on your distribution.)

Another option is to use the configure flag --disable-disassembler, which removes this dependency.

Where do I get jni.h?

It is included in GNU Classpath. On Debian systems you find it in the classpath-common package

You may have to specify --with-classpath-includedir for this file to be found (see below).

Where do I get ltdl.h?

You need the libltdl3-dev package, or something equivalent.

Help! My Classpath is split into /usr/lib, /usr/include, and so on

This is the case for many distributions. You can specify the individual paths like this (for CACAO SVN):

./configure --with-classpath-libdir=/usr/lib/classpath \
            --with-classpath-includedir=/usr/include/classpath \
            --with-classpath-glibj-zip=/usr/share/classpath/glibj.zip

For CACAO 0.96 ( TODO: check if this really works!):

./configure --with-classpath-prefix=/usr \
            --with-classpath-libdir=/usr/lib/classpath \
            --with-classpath-includedir=/usr/include/classpath

Using CACAO

Do I have to set BOOTCLASSPATH?

Short answer: No.

If you have installed CACAO (using make install or your package manager), you do not have to set BOOTCLASSPATH. If this variable is not set, CACAO will use built-in defaults to find its own and Classpath's classes. Note that setting the variable to an empty string is not the same as unsetting it. Use unset BOOTCLASSPATH to be sure.

If you compiled CACAO from source but did not install it, you can use the script contrib/setenvsource to set up the environment correctly.

I want to set BOOTCLASSPATH anyway. What's the right value?

Set it like this:

export BOOTCLASSPATH=$CACAO_PREFIX/share/cacao/vm.zip:$CLASSPATH_PREFIX/share/classpath/glibj.zip