I was unable to find a means to get Java to work on a PowerPC based Linux distribution. There are a lot of interpreters like Java, Shockwave, Flash, and others that don’t work on PowerPC based Linux. Its one of the difficulties of straying from the PC world.

This is a solution I found to get around the Java problem. The rest I haven’t found any thing for, yet.

For all of the commands and paths I used the ones that came up when I ran this on my machine. You may need to adjust them to match any changes.

You’ll need to get a copy of IBM’s Java package. Its available here. You’ll need to register with the site, which is free to do, in order to get to the download.

You’ll want to get the RPM for the IBM SDK for 32-bit iSeries/pSeries.

Once you have the RPM you’ll need to install it. If you are using a distribution that uses RPM’s for its packages you are all set. If you are using a distribution that uses Apt you’ll need to convert it to a usable format.

To do that get a copy of Alien, which should be available in the Apt repository. Then run the command:

alien -d IBMJava2-SDK-ppc-1.4.2-0.0.ppc.rpm

Then use Dpkg to install the .deb file created by Alien.

dpkg -i ibmjava2-sdk-ppc_1.4.2-1_powerpc.deb

You’ll need to add the directory Java is installed in to the environment Path variable. If you are using a Bash shell you just need to edit your .bashrc or the /etc/bash/bashrc file. You’ll want to add the line:

export PATH="$PATH:/opt/IBMJava2-ppc-142/bin"

Once that is done Java should be all set. Try to run a Java application just to be sure. I ran into a problem where it would crash using that default install. If that happens you’ll need to add another environment variable. For Bash shells add this to you .bashrc or /etc/bash/bashrc file:

export JITC_PROCESSOR_TYPE=6

I’m not entirely convinced this is still useful information. Now that Java has been open sourced and PowerPC computers aren’t being made it shouldn’t be long until Java is available in every distribution.