Warning: -23 not understood. Ignoring.

Question

I've ran into what I think is a simple problem but I don't know how to resolve it.
I need to pass negative arguments to a Java application (i.e. java JavaApp -23). This works in Windows but no on RedHat 9. I think it doesn't work because Linux thinks I'm passing a parameter (i.e. ls -la).
I have tried to wrap the command-line argument in quotes and various other things (java JavaApp "-23" or '-23' or --23).
I get the following error;
Warning: -23 not understood. Ignoring.
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException: 0
at 0x40268e17: java.lang.Throwable.Throwable(java.lang.String) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4025bcd2: java.lang.Exception.Exception(java.lang.String) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4025f592: java.lang.RuntimeException.RuntimeException(java.lang.String) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4025c7ee: java.lang.IndexOutOfBoundsException.IndexOutOfBoundsException(java.lang.String) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x402581c2: java.lang.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException(java.lang.String) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4021b5e6: JvThrowBadArrayIndex (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4022eca1: JvInterpMethod.continue1(_Jv_InterpMethodInvocation) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x40230ff4: JvInterpMethod.run(ffi_cif, void, ffi_raw, JvInterpMethodInvocation) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4022e504: JvInterpMethod.run_normal(ffi_cif, void, ffi_raw, void) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4038305c: ?? (??:0)
at 0x40242dd8: gnu.gcj.runtime.FirstThread.call_main() (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x402ad02d: gnu.gcj.runtime.FirstThread.run() (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4024fc4c: JvThreadRun(java.lang.Thread) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x4021c8ac: JvRunMain(java.lang.Class, byte const, int, byte const, boolean) (/usr/lib/./libgcj.so.3)
at 0x08048910: ?? (??:0)
at 0x42015704: __libc_start_main (/lib/tls/libc.so.6)
at 0x080486c1: ?? (??:0)

Answer 1

I could give you guys a big hug. Ok I won't... scared
of the sexual harrassment lawsuit and all.
I renamed the stupid script in /usr/bin to java2.
RedHat you are so stupid.
I then gave appropriate read and executible rights to
others in the jdk folder.
Restarted my session and voila! It all seems to work.
I'm sure I'll have to play with appropriate rights
down the line, but now I'm extremely happy.
So is there a way to mark this as solved?Cool, glad you found it.
To tie up loose ends...
Were you shocked and apalled that java was a script, or that it was in usr/bin? I'm pretty sure that the usual case is for the java that your PATH picks up first to be a shell (or .bat) script. I thought that the usual place to find it though was $JDK_HOME/bin/java or $JRE_HOME/bin/java but as it turns out, on my Mac it's also /usr/bin/java, and all it does is exec /System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Commands/java "$@" but then OS X is a bit of an odd beast anyway.
You may already know this, but ...
* The suggestion I made to pull things apart was just a temporary one to help you get it going, with the expectation that you'd put things back together "the right way" once you found the source of the problem.
* If you want to run something other than /usr/bin/java, then make sure it's marked as executable and its directory is in your path ahead of /usr/bin. You may also have to either open a new shell or do something like "rehash" or "hash -r" to flush the "path cache."