Automating Oracle Java 7 updates

Something I’ve wanted to do for a while was to write a script to download and install the latest Java 7 update from Oracle. I’ve been using AutoPkg to download the latest Java 7 updates using AutoPkg’s OracleJava7 recipes, but I wanted to develop a script that would do the following:

1. Download the latest Java 7 installer from Oracle’s website
2. Install the latest Java 7 update
3. Clean up after itself

Oracle didn’t make this an easy task, as the download URL seems to change on a per-update version. AutoPkg handles its update task by scraping Oracle’s manual download page for the current correct URL to use.

Oracle does provide a Sparkle-based update mechanism for Java 7 on OS X, so I wanted to see if there was a way to leverage that to pull down updates. The only address I could find in that regard was the SUFeedURL value included in Java 7’s /Library/Internet Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin/Contents/Info.plist file. I checked that value using the following command:

defaults read "/Library/Internet Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin/Contents/Info" SUFeedURL

The output I received for Java 7 Update 67 was the following:

https://javadl-esd-secure.oracle.com/update/mac/au-1.7.0_67.xml

I decided to see what output would come back from Oracle’s site when accessed, so I used the following curl command to see what was returned:

/usr/bin/curl --silent https://javadl-esd-secure.oracle.com/update/mac/au-1.7.0_67.xml 

The following XML was returned and I was gratified to see that it contained a download link to a Java 7 Update 67 disk image.

One of the important things I was able to establish is that the XML address embedded with Java 7 Update 67 is not special in this regard. As part of my testing, I verified that using the SUFeedURL value for Java 7 Update 15 and 65 will also work to pull the address of the latest Oracle Java 7 installer disk image.

Using this information, I was able to build a script that can download and install the latest Java 7 update. See below the jump for details.

The script below will download a disk image containing the latest version of Java 7 from Oracle and install Java 7 using the installer package stored inside the downloaded disk image.

How the script works:

1. Uses curl to download a disk image containing the latest Java 7 installer from Oracle’s web site.
2. Renames the downloaded disk image to java_seven.dmg and stores it in /tmp.
3. Mounts the disk image silently in /tmp. The mounted disk image will not be visible to any logged-in user.
4. Installs the latest version of Java 7 using the installer package stored on the disk image.
5. After installation, unmounts the disk image and removes it from the Mac in question.

I’ve posted the script to my GitHub repo at the following address:

https://github.com/rtrouton/rtrouton_scripts/tree/master/rtrouton_scripts/install_latest_oracle_java_7

This script is also available as a payload-free installer package, stored as a .zip file in the payload_free_installer directory.