Frequently Asked Questions - Support Related

License Key

C1. After I purchased your products, I received an confirmation email asking for my company name and product name. I can understand why you need my company but I don't understand why you need my product name. Could you explain to me?
JIDE has been used by many companies. Even in the same company, there could be many product teams using JIDE at the same time. In order to uniquely identify each license key, we require both company name and product name so that unique license key can be generated even within the same company.

C2. I worked on a confidential project and I really cannot disclose the project name to you to generate a license key. What should I do?
That's fine. We just need some kind of name to identify your project. So you can use a code name or an informal name that is not confidential. If you really don't have any name, we will consider using the PO number as the project name.

C3. I installed the license key as instructed but I still get evaluation warning dialog. What did I do wrong?
The evaluation package will always popup the evaluation warning dialog no matter what license key you used. Please follow the instruction in the product delivery email (usually the subject of the email is "Thanks for choosing JIDE products"). It has the download link, user name and password to get the formal release package.

C4. I downloaded the formal release package and I installed the license key at my main() method, but I still get license warning dialog saying I didn't purchase certain product. What did I do wrong?
Most likely you use some JIDE classes before Lm.verifyLicense is called. Check if you have some static fields that use JIDE classes. Usually, you can fix the problem by moving Lm.verifyLicense to a static block at the beginning of the class which has the main() method. The other possible reason is if you are using a version before 1.9.3 and you get a newer version license key, it won't work. If so, please ask sales@jidesoft.com to generate a license key for 1.9.3. If it still doesn't work, please email support@jidesoft.com for help.

C5. I am a customer and I registered on the developer forum. However I can't access certain customer only forums. What should I do?
The customer only forums is a place for customers to have discussion. Even if you purchase from us, you will not get access to customer only forums automatically as it is hard for us to match a forum account with a developer. So please email sales@jidesoft.com your user id on the forum and ask for permission. I would also suggest you use your company email address as the forum account email address so that you can instant notification when we reply your post. Some free email accounts block the forum notification emails.

Common Support Questions

D1. How do I find out which JIDE version I am on?
 You just run "java -jar jide-common.jar". It will print out JIDE version number. In 2.1 release, it will print out some system properties too. Please include the whole print out when submitting a bug to avoid we come back and ask you the question.

D2. I need to report a bug. What should I do?
Before submitting any bugs, please search the forum first to find out if someone else has submitted the same or similar bug. If your maintenance is still valid, always download and try the latest version before submitting. Secondly, make sure it's not a Swing bug. You can search in the bug parade website on the Java website or remove all references to JIDE classes and see if the bug still exists. We don't promise to fix or workaround Swing bugs. Thirdly, make sure it's not a bug in your own code. The easiest way is to find out if you can reproduce the bug in one of our examples. Usually if it is a JIDE bug, you can reproduce it in our example with or without modification. Last but not least, it is highly recommended that you include a test case when submitting the bug so that we can run and debug. It will not only save our time to figure out what's wrong, will also save your time as we put bug report with test case a higher priority.

D3. I understand I need to make a test case in order to submit a bug in my application. However for some unknown reason,  I just can't reproduce it in your demos. What should I do?
It happened. Here are a few steps that might help. If the bug produces an exception that has JIDE code in the stack, download the debug jars from the customer download website and run with it. You will see the stack trace that has line number in JIDE source code. The line number sometimes helps us to find out the issue but not always. If you have source code license, it will be very useful in this case. I would suggest you to debug into our source code and try to figure out what's wrong. We understand it is not your responsibility to debug our source code, but instead of wasting time finding a test case, it is usually a lot faster if you debug into our source code. Last straw is to let us have your application. This solution is not always there because sometimes your application is very complex and need many prerequisites that we can't meet. In any cases, when we get this kind of tough bug, both of us have to work together closely in order to fix it. Please try to refrain yourself from complaining and frustration.

D4. There is a JIDE bug in the release I am using. You fixed this bug in the latest release. As we are close to the final release, I can't upgrade to it. Can I get a patch on the version I use which only fixes this particular bug?
 Unfortunately, we only fix bugs on the latest version. Patching a particular version takes us a long time so the default support option doesn't include this kind of service. However we will do it by charging a service fee. For small bug, it starts from minimum of 2 hours. It could take longer if the bug fix is complex. Please also note, sometimes one bug fix depends on another. It could end up with a situation that patching a particular version is impossible.

D5. I got compile error like "... class file has wrong version 49.0, should be 45.0 or 46.0 or 47.0 or 48.0". How do I solve it?
 By default, ach JDK will generate class files with different version. JDK 1.4.2 is 48.0. JDK 5 is 49.0 and JDK 6 is 50.0. We use JDK 5 to compile with "target" flag set to 1.5 which mean our classes have version 49.0. Those classes will only be recognized by JDK 5 and above.  You get this error because you are still on JDK 1.4.2. To solve this problem, we used Retroweaver to convert JDK 5 class to be JDK 1.4 compatible. In either download page or evaluation package, you can click on the "Release for JDK1.4" link to get those jars.

             Our support policy is to only officially support two JDK versions are the same time. We used to support both JDK1.4 and JDK5. Since now JDK 6 is out, we are supporting JDK 5 and JDK 6. We understand you may have to stay with JDK1.4.2 for whatever reason but if you can please upgrade to JDK 5 or even 6 as soon as you can.

D6. Can I ask your Swing related question which has nothing to do with JIDE?
 It is our company policy to answer only JIDE related questions. The technical support staffs reserve the right to say no if the questions are basic Swing questions which have nothing to do with JIDE. Otherwise it might consume our technical support resource and delay the support for other customers. We suggest you ask those questions on java forums.

We understand sometimes it is hard to tell if it is a JIDE question or a Swing question. The way to find out is to remove the usage of JIDE classes and/or replace them by the corresponding Swing classs such as JideButton with JButton, JideTabbedPane with JTabbedPane etc. For example, you find a bug when using JideTabbedPane. If it is not obvious if it is a JideTabbedPane bug, just replace it with JTabbedPane. If the bug is still there, it is most likely a Swing bug. Otherwise, it is probably JIDE bug. Please do this kind of replacement test before asking questions unless it is obvious a JIDE issue.