Adobe Flash and Java are two downloads most of us have installed on our Windows computers, as they give us a richer internet and browsing experience. We have already seen how to manage Adobe Flash Settings. Today we will learn about Java Settings in Windows 10/8/7.
What is Java
Java is a programming language and computing platform, which powers state-of-the-art programs including utilities, games, and business applications. It allows you to play online games, chat with people around the world, view images in 3D, and more.
Java Control Panel
Java software or the Java Runtime Environment is also referred to as the Java Runtime, Runtime Environment, Runtime, JRE, Java Virtual Machine, etc. It can be managed from the Java Control Panel. To access the Java Control Panel, open Control Panel and click on Java. Here you will be able to get information on the version number and also View the files.
Remove temporary Java files
When browsing the internet, whenever your browser uses Java, the Java files are stored in special folders for quicker execution later on.
To see the location of the folder and other details, click on the Settings button.
By default, these temporary java files are stored in the
C:\Users\Username\AppData\LocalLow\Sun\Java\Deployment\cache
folder in the JAR format. You can set the compression level for these JAR files and even set the amount to be set aside for storing these files.
You can view the files by clicking on the View button.
To delete these temporary Java JAR files, click on Delete Files. Now you can select which files you wish to delete and click on OK.
Clear Java cache using command line
To clear Java cache using the command line, open a command prompt windows, type the following and press Enter:
javaws -uninstall
Java Update
We tend to ignore updating our Java. But it is very important that we always make sure that you are using the latest version of Java since vulnerabilities in Java are often exploited to compromise your computer. The latest Java version contains important enhancements to improve the security, performance, and stability of the Java applications that run on your machine. Whenever security holes are detected, they are patched, and it is therefore imperative that you ensure that you have the latest version of java installed as it includes vulnerability fixes.
You can configure the Java update settings by clicking on the Update tab.
Make sure that the Check for Updates Automatically is checked. Clicking on the Advanced button will let you set the frequency of the update checks.
By the way, I noticed that it was a long time since I had updated Java. So I clicked on Update Now to start the update process. This starts the juscheck.exe process, which will check if an update is available and accordingly inform you.
Clicking on Install will start the update process. Once it is completed, click on Close.
Other Java settings
The Java tab lets you view and manage the Java Runtime versions and settings for Java applications and applets.
The Security tab lets you view the type of certificates to identify yourself.
The Advanced tab lets you configure other settings.
Uninstall Old Java versions
Keeping old and unsupported versions of Java on your system presents a serious security risk.
Older versions of SunJava (up to JRE 6 update 7) indeed did remain when updates were installed and need to be removed as the older versions of SunJava are highly vulnerable to Winfixer/Vundo. It took from 2005 until the update late last year to JRE 6 update 10 for SunMicrosystems to Sun Microsystems to get the autoupdater of SunJava to uninstall previous (vulnerable) versions of the program. Updates from JRE 6 Update 10 forward are in a self-contained “jre6” folder that is overwritten if a new JRE is installed. Even when using the most up-to-date version of SunJava, if older, vulnerable, version(s) are still on your computer, it is vulnerable to infection. Unfortunately, simply using Add/Remove programs to uninstall the old versions is not completely affective.
We suggest you try JavaRa. After updating Java to its latest version today, I ran JavaRa and used it to remove older Java versions.
It detected two older versions on my computer, which I then removed.
NOTE. My MVP colleague and TWCF Mod Corrine adds: JavaRa hasn’t been updated to support the removal of JRE 7 and seems to have trouble past JRE 6u32. It has moved to SingularLabs.com. In addition, Paul McLain no longer supports JavaRa, but Freð ðe Vries still does.
Java Download
You can download and install Java for Windows manually from Java.com here.
Hope you have learned something new here in this post. If you have anything more to add, please do so in the comments section.
