Applet unable to load JARs from URL?

Question

Please let me preface my query with "I have not done applets ever for live business apps, only for uni and that was over a decade ago..." :)
I've been doing a lot of reading the last couple days and have been trying to modify a currently existing applet which unfortunately currently depends on libraries being installed in the ext dir on the user's PC (!). I am modifying it such that 1. it will now make a web service call and 2. it will need to include all of the good libraries that come with making web service calls. My other goal is to change the way the applet is loaded (applet tag) so that the libraries need not be pre-installed in the user's ext dir.
My trouble is, I cannot seem to persuade the applet to load the libraries that co-exist with it. I am loading the applet via a simple test harness page presently, where the HTML file resides in one directory (http://localhost/cis/dictation/test1.html) and the JARs in another (http://localhost/cis/common), but all at the same subdir level under the main web root. I know the applet is loading, as I have a test debug statement which prints out on each invocation.
Note If I load all of the JARs in the dependency hierarchy into the extensions directory, everything works swimmingly.
I have tried multiple variations on the applet tag, not completely sure of what it should look like. Please note when I load the URLs into the browser for each individual library, e.g. http://localhost/cis/common/axis.jar, the browser prompts me to download the JARs, so I know the browser can "see" them.
<applet code="webmedx.client.applet.audio.TransferApplet.class"
     codebase="http://localhost/cis/common/"
     name=TransferApplet      
     width=10 height=10
     archive="audio.jar,axis.jar,jaxrpc.jar,jndi.jar,commons-logging.jar,commons-discovery.jar"
     MAYSCRIPT>
     <PARAM NAME="image" VALUE="images/webmedx_icon-32x32.gif">
     <PARAM NAME="boxmessage" VALUE="Loading the Webmedx Audio Player">
     <PARAM NAME="cache_archive" VALUE="../common/audio.jar">
     <PARAM NAME="DebugLevel" value="1">
     <PARAM NAME="userenterprise" VALUE="BHS">
     <PARAM NAME="userfacility" VALUE="BHS">
     <param name="scriptable" value="true">
</applet>Using path relative to the browser URL (http://localhost/cis/dictation/test1.html):
<applet
     codebase="../common"
     archive="audio.jar,axis.jar,jaxrpc.jar,jndi.jar,commons-logging.jar,commons-discovery.jar"
     code="webmedx.client.applet.audio.TransferApplet.class"
     name="TransferApplet"
     width="0" height="0"
     MAYSCRIPT>
     <PARAM NAME="image" VALUE="images/webmedx_icon-32x32.gif">
     <PARAM NAME="boxmessage" VALUE="Loading the Webmedx Audio Player">
     <PARAM NAME="cache_archive" VALUE="../common/audio.jar">
     <PARAM NAME="DebugLevel" value="1">
     <PARAM NAME="userenterprise" VALUE="BHS">
     <PARAM NAME="userfacility" VALUE="BHS">
     <param name="scriptable" value="true">
</applet>Each of these results in the java console reporting a NCDFE for javax/xml/rpc/Service, which it should be able to locate in http://localhost/cis/common/jaxrpc.jar.
Then on subsequent page reloads, the java console reports NCDFE's for the newly added class WITHIN the applet jar, webmedx/client/applet/util/cdsproxy/WSAudioArchiveLocator (assuming because it requires javax.xml.rpc.Service, and cannot load it).
Any ideas/help will be very much appreciated :)
Edited by: alexx_wmx on Jul 13, 2010 4:17 PM

Answer 1

ejp wrote:
Those JARs must be installed in the lib/ext directory of the JRE to work correctly. ..Do they? I am surprised to hear that, but have not dealt with them directly. Why?
Note that I had asked the OP not to split what I feel is one question, into two threads. The other thread is at.. [http://forums.sun.com/thread.jspa?threadID=5444667], which had itself already been spawned from another thread.
(sigh..) Following this topic is beginning to make my head hurt.