Annoyance - latest Java JRE update too automated

Question

I am quite annoyed that someone somewhere made a choice that took away an install option I've relied upon and has suddenly made life much more difficult. In the past, whenever I chose to or wanted to update my runtime environment, I was able to manually invoke the update (I always turn the auto-update service off!!!). Then, during the update install, there USED to exist a checkbox providing an option to install the update to a location OF MY CHOICE as opposed to the much-abused "Program Files" location. Why was this option removed from the latest version of the update? I now am forced to walk through all my registry entries and hope I find all references to this crap and change them to the location I EXPECT and INSIST on the update existing. On a number of production systems, I have chosen to uninstall or not even allow the update because I don't know what else you broke and am not willing to spend an inordinate time going through an elaborate test cycle wasting unfunded, overtaxed and much-beleagured resources.
I beseech you as a long-time Java developer, a Sun shareholder, and avid advocate of the mighty Sun - please bring me back my choice of install location for the JRE update!
da Lizard

Answer 1

Lounge_Lizard wrote:
It is my experience that there are those who have some Sun influence DO in fact read and monitor the forums...
In most forums that is not the case.
It has been my experience that most JRE updates are not simple in-place patches. Rather, the update is a complete self-contained install of the JRE files. I have ALWAYS used the checkmark option and place each update in a folder specific to that update. This way, I've been able to isolate JRE version compatibility in my production systems and it has allowed my staff to manage our runtime environments. This last update did not provide me with the option as all the other updates since 1.4 have.
Certainly sounds reasonable. Someone at Sun thinks it is a patch though. The bug that was opened above has been closed by specifically noting that it is a patch.
So in terms of your goal you would probably need to write a wrapper that going forward allows them to differentiate an update that allows for an alternative location and one that does not.