Is oracle java required for insteonplm? Is install via paperui OK?

I am retrying openhabian (latest), using the defaults for the most part.
I’ve added insteonplm via the paperui
using it with Hub 2014
I configured a bunch of insteon items
I get a lot of insteonplm warnings.
I can see some things update via the logger (if I turn on a switch manually, for example).
I can “sometimes” control something from classicUI for example.

But everything is slow (taking minutes if ever but mostly not responding).

Is it OK to install insteonplm via paperui? I thought I have done that in the past and it worked.

openhabian uses Zulu OpenJDK - is that a known problem for insteonplm?
[06:55:30] openhabian@openHABianPi:~$ java -version
openjdk version “1.8.0_121”
OpenJDK Runtime Environment (Zulu Embedded 8.20.0.42-linux-aarch32hf) (build 1.8.0_121-b42)
OpenJDK Client VM (Zulu Embedded 8.20.0.42-linux-aarch32hf) (build 25.121-b42, mixed mode, Evaluation)
[08:13:17] openhabian@openHABianPi:~$

This seems to imply that Zulu java has no downsides:
http://docs.openhab.org/installation/#prerequisites

Yes, Oracle Java is required.

@ranielsen, First time I’ve heard of this. Zulu JDK is a 100% certified build of openJDK. Could you link me to anything that states that oracle JDK must be used?

@benjy, There have been various problems by others that have been resolved by switching from OpenJDK to Oracle JDK. OpenJDK is not 100% compatible with Oracle JDK.

I expect there to be problems sometimes with standard OpenJDK, but not with Zulu’s Java, which is supposedly 100% compliant.

Unfortunately, however I am unfamiliar with insteonplm. @jtmoderate876, what are the warnings you get for it?

I don’t know if you get any warnings. Just never connects to the PLM. I
think its an issue with the RXTX module or something like that.

The big Warning was every 5 minutes that it couldn’t complete db download from PLM/HUB, retrying…

I also get the (unfortunately typical):
[…ding.insteonplm.internal.driver.Port] - bad data received: got unknown command code 0x16

where 0x16 might be anything.

but that always happens

===UPDATE===

Over lunch I moved to Oracle and am getting fewer issues. I moved via the following commands:

[06:55:30] openhabian@openHABianPi:~$ java -version
openjdk version "1.8.0_121"
OpenJDK Runtime Environment (Zulu Embedded 8.20.0.42-linux-aarch32hf) (build 1.8.0_121-b42)
OpenJDK Client VM (Zulu Embedded 8.20.0.42-linux-aarch32hf) (build 25.121-b42, mixed mode, Evaluation)
[08:13:17] openhabian@openHABianPi:~$

sudo apt-get install oracle-java8-jdk
sudo update-java-alternatives -s jdk-8-oracle-arm32-vfp-hflt

[13:46:13] openhabian@openHABianPi:~$ java -version
java version "1.8.0_65"
Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.8.0_65-b17)
Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 25.65-b01, mixed mode)
[13:46:27] openhabian@openHABianPi:~$

===
Since upgrading no the DB from PLM/HUB gets downloaded OK (almost takes the full5 minutes):

2017-10-18 13:52:39.452 [INFO ] [b.core.service.AbstractActiveService] - InsteonPLM has been started
2017-10-18 13:52:39.485 [INFO ] [g.insteonplm.InsteonPLMActiveBinding] - config: port_0 -> /hub2/myuser:mypass@192.168.1.231:25105,poll_time=1000
2017-10-18 13:52:39.642 [INFO ] [g.insteonplm.InsteonPLMActiveBinding] - devices:   0 configured,   0 polling, msgs received:     0
2017-10-18 13:52:40.116 [INFO ] [g.insteonplm.InsteonPLMActiveBinding] - config: service.pid -> org.openhab.insteonplm
...
2017-10-18 13:57:04.604 [INFO ] [g.insteonplm.InsteonPLMActiveBinding] - modem database has 68 entries!

so it took from 2017-10-18 13:52:39.452 to 2017-10-18 13:57:04.604 which is about 4 minutes 25 seconds.

At least with Oracle it is finishing and response to turning a light on manually via BasicUI has gone from multiple minutes and unreliable under Zulu OpenJDK to reliable and 1 or two seconds [actually it is now reliably under one second response]

I’m not blaming the design of Zulu OpenJDK nor promoting Oracle over it, it is just that in the case of using insteonPLM binding against a HUB2014 over a network connection, insteonplm binding is clearly operating better.

===

For now I would summarize by saying if you are using insteonplm binding, at least to a Hub2014 (2245-222) via ethernet you want to move/change openhabian from its default to using Oracle JDK.

Yup, this is what I’ve seen in the past…

It’s good to know though, this is the first time I’ve heard of Zulu having problems like this. If anyone can point me in the direction of similar threads, it’d be good to get the recommendation changed in the docs if it’s a prevailant issue.

@ThomDietrich, have you heard of similar issue from people using openHABian? Is it a limitation of the RPi?

Nope never heard of issues with Zulu till now.

@ranielsen please be aware that you are mixing topics. openJDK posed problems for openHAB in the past and was hence discouraged for use with openHAB. Zulu Java didn’t have these issues and is the recommended JRE for openHAB since a few months now.

@Benjy @rlkoshak @Kai Let’s stay calm and observe the issue and have a lookout for further user reports. If the issues are limited to the insteon binding, maybe the real solution lies there.

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@ThomDietrich how am I mixing topics? Did you read @jtmoderate876 response above? Here’s part of it:

I think we are getting caught up in wording but we otherwise understand each other.

There are 3 different options which probably need more distinct names:
OpenJDK
Zulu OpenJDK
and Oracle JDK

Zulu OpenJDK is preferred for most things but not insteonplm binding.

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Yep agreed. @ranielsen I understood and am not doubting the issue at hand. I just wanted to make clear that problems with openJDK in the past can not be projected onto Zulu lightly.

As for resolving the issue: @jtmoderate876 found a solution for now :+1: However it would be good to investigate further. If the binding is indeed the only one with issues, maybe the cause can be found in the sources. @Kai what’s your opinion about this?

I agree that it should be further investigated. If we indeed discover a situation where the ZuluVM has an issue, we should report this as I would expect that Azul would want fix this.

One thing that might be the case is that I’ve noticed that you’ve gone

from  1.8.0_121 (Zulu)
to    1.8.0_85  (Oracle)

Do later versions have similar problems to insteonplm, even in Oracle JDK?

1 Like