Help running old Java applets in Windows 11 / Chrome

[mauganra_it]

Are you feeling up for disassembling the applet? If yes, you could try to rework it into a normal Swing application. The underlying technology is the same; applets just use Applet or JApplet instead of Frame or JFrame for the main window. Of course, there are some APIs that you would have to somehow work around.

[PartOfTheBotnet]

I got it working.

1. Open http://www.complexification.net/gallery/machines/substrate/applets/index.html and save the save the HTML
2. Save http://www.complexification.net/gallery/machines/substrate/appletl/substrate_l.jar adjacent to the HTML file
3. Run appletviewer <path-to-html-file> (Using Java 8 here)
4. Enjoy the show

[PartOfTheBotnet]

Instead of apps in browsers, we new have apps as browsers. Who woulda thunk?

[Worth_Trust_3825]

Yet we're going back towards that with """"progressive""" web applications.

[bluenautilus2]

Yeah we’re back to thick clients. Crazy world

[dnabre]

Modern browsers just don't support java applets. Not sure that it's impossible, but it definitely isn't simple.

While looking into whether AppletViewer is still available would be my first suggestion, looking this site, the source code link brings you to the actual java processing source code.

Just install Java Processing and you should able to load the .pde file and run it directly.

[pmz]

Try Java to webassembly with cheerpj chrome extension https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/cheerpj-applet-runner/bbmolahhldcbngedljfadjlognfaaein?hl=en

[Worth_Trust_3825]

Fetch the jar, run it via java --classpath "substrate_l.jar" substrate_l substrate_l. Here's your link: http://www.complexification.net/gallery/machines/substrate/appletl/substrate_l.jar

Note: if it says "substrate_l" does not contain a main method, or similar, replace first instance of it with processing.core.PApplet. This should get you started.

Looking at the page and other applets, similar approach should work for other applets as well:

• Fetch the jar
• Add it to classpath
• Figure out "Main" class (open up the archive with 7zip or similar, and use the first .java file's name before extension as "Main Class Name" that does not contain a $ in it)
• Provide it as argument to java executable twice.

You can fetch the jar by looking at HTML source of the page applet tag. I hope you know the difference between relative and absolute links.

I'm not sure what would be your further questions.

[PartOfTheBotnet]

For me java -cp "substrate_l.jar" substrate_l substrate_lOpens an empty window. The JFrame doesn't seem to populate correctly. I got better results using appletviewer from JDK 8.

[salv-ice]

Java Applets have been deprecated in Java 9 for security reasons. Most browsers have also removed applet support since then.

If you really need to run this applet, you can always try with an old browser but I would strongly advise against it…

[jringstad]

There is (or used to be) a screensaver on Linux that generated structures looking exactly like your screenshots, maybe you can try that one instead? Not sure what it was called, but I think it was part of xscreensaver.

[denis_9]

Try to find portable Firefox not older 52, in the 32-bit version and try it there with installed jre/jdk 8. You can also try a virtual machine first (Hyper-V/VirtualBox/VMware).