ASRock Rack C2550D4I Console Redirection (jviewer) blank screen on macOS Catalina 10.15

mgd

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Jan 8, 2017
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46
I have been using the Java-based jviewer to remote control my ASRock Rack C2550D4I motherboard. It has been working fine (with some quirks) over the years.

Recently, I upgraded to macOS Catalina (currently on version 10.15.2) and since then I can launch jviewer but I get a blank / black screen and it says [0 fps] in the console.

My son is on macOS 10.14.6 (Mojave) and he can launch jviewer and it works as intended. If he and I connect at the same time, he can see my keystrokes are actually received by the server as they show up on his screen. When I click the button for the virtual keyboard nothings happens whereas on his machine the virtual keyboard appears.

He is on Java version 1.8.0_u221.
I am on Java version 1.8.0_u231. (Also tried on previous 1.8 versions u202 and u60 which worked before upgrading to Catalina.)
My BMC is at the newest version: 0.35.00 (Jun 23 2017 16:35:57 CST)

Any ideas how to get this working?

P.S. I know jviewer has been the topic of many old threads but I haven't found a resolution to this.

P.P.S. I am aware I could also use Console Redirection with SOL (Serial Over LAN) and I will also look into that, but that is not what I am searching for an answer for here. (I have tried, but FreeNAS 11.2 does allow me to select the serial port in the GUI so I haven't go that working yet.)
 

poldi

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Jun 7, 2019
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Hi,
well I just swapped my old ASRock Rack E3C226D2I out against the X470D4U. One of the reasons for that was this stupid java based console. So I cannot test anymore how this will work in 10.15.
I do remember however that I needed to install XQuartz for the viewer to show a feed. You can check on the 10.14 system there should be an additional app launching when you start the viewer. I recon that during your upgrade to Catalina this might have been removed or deactivated as Apple likes to do this with ‘unnecessary’ add ons these days.
Otherwise did you open a ticket with ASRock? They are always quite helpful and respond in reasonable time.
 

mgd

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Jan 8, 2017
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Hi @poldi and thank you for replying. Yes, I have XQuartz running but you are right I also seem to remember that there used to be two Java apps launching on 10.14 but now it is only Jviewer. I have an idea that macOS Security/Privacy is blocking something.

It sounds like a good idea to open a support ticket with ASRock. I will try that.
 

poldi

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Security settings in Catalina would have been my next guess. These definitely need some more polish from Apple especially when you try to run something from within a browser session that needs elevated privileges or wants to install something and is not signed by Apple. That could very well be the case here.
 

mgd

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@poldi Tried to contact ASRock. Latest answer is:

Apologize for your inconvenience, maybe it will be more efficient if you ask Apple about MAC OS compatibility.

Because we can use kvm under other linux distribution like Ubuntu 16.04 , Ubuntu 18.04, Cent OS7.3.

Although MAC OS is based on Linux, we don’t know which function in MAC OS would affect kvm or other tools.

So it does not seem I can expect much help from the vendor.

Does anybody else have an idea what could be the problem…
  • some permission that needs to be explicitly granted
  • macOS 10.15 no longer supports 32 bit apps
…and how to fix it?
 

poldi

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Ok that answer from ASRock is wrong on so many levels that I don’t care to count. However it becomes obvious that testing on Mac OS is not included for them otherwise they might be at least able to confirm if there is an issue. On top of that I also don’t think there is much interest to maintain this jviewer. I would recon this is caused by the enhanced Gatekeeper in Catalina but to my knowledge, other than downgrading to 10.14, it is currently not possible to deactivate it (even temporarily).
As I said I upgraded recently to the HTML5 based viewer (which works very well btw) and sold my old E3C226D2I. So I have no way to test it. So guess we have to wait for someone who has either the same issue or found a workaround.
The only suggestions I would have is to create a 10.14 boot environment or to run a Linux distro in Virtualbox. Well you could also hook up keyboard and mouse to the server.
I know these options all kinda suck.
 

mgd

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Ok that answer from ASRock is wrong on so many levels that I don’t care to count.

:D

Yes, my conclusion is also, that they are not testing on Mac and don't really want to do anything about this issue.

I am also pretty sure that this issue is caused by Gate Keeper and I have been trying to figure out if I could add some permission in System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy but with no luck. I would be guessing that Java (the executable) needs a specific right.

Currently, I have a screen and keyboard hooked up but will move the server to a place where it makes no sense. So I guess my best option is a 10.14 environment in Parallels or a Linux VM.
 

poldi

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Didn’t think I would ever say this but in Catalina I wish for a ‘Run as administrator and shut the f... up’ option like in, god forbid, Windows ;)
 

mgd

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@poldi Hmm, tried with Mojave in a VM (Parallels) and after a lot of problems getting Java Web Start working I ended up using Iced Tea Web and an OpenJDK 8 from Azul. When launching jviewer I still get a blank screen, but because I am using Iced Tea Web now I can see something in the terminal where I started jviewer:

Code:
macos-10:~ mgd$ Downloads/icedtea-web-image/bin/javaws.sh  Downloads/jviewer-7.jnlp 
Warning! JAVA_HOME of /Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/zulu-8.jdk/Contents/Home in play!
warning, using portable itw from /Users/mgd/Downloads/icedtea-web-image: -Xbootclasspath/a:/Users/mgd/Downloads/icedtea-web-image/share/icedtea-web/javaws.jar:/Users/mgd/Downloads/icedtea-web-image/share/icedtea-web/plugin.jar:/Users/mgd/Downloads/icedtea-web-image/share/icedtea-web/jsobject.jar:/Users/mgd/Downloads/icedtea-web-image/linux-deps-runtime/tagsoup.jar:/Users/mgd/Downloads/icedtea-web-image/linux-deps-runtime/js.jar /Users/mgd/Downloads/icedtea-web-image/bin/javaws.sh /Users/mgd/Downloads/icedtea-web-image/share/icedtea-web/javaws_splash.png
IcedTea-Web 1.8.3-4
Using JRE version 1.8.0_232-b18 OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM
Property "ows.install4j.propertyUpdate" is unknown.
Property "ows.jvm.manager.vendor" is unknown.
WARNING: GL pipe is running in software mode (Renderer ID=0x1020400)
Unable to use Firefox's proxy settings. Using "DIRECT" as proxy type.
This application does not specify a Codebase in its manifest. Please verify with the applet's vendor. Continuing. See: http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/technotes/guides/jweb/security/no_redeploy.html for details.
This application does not specify a Codebase in its manifest. Please verify with the applet's vendor. Continuing. See: http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/technotes/guides/jweb/security/no_redeploy.html for details.
Application title was not found in manifest. Check with application vendor
Application title was not found in manifest. Check with application vendor
Application title was not found in manifest. Check with application vendor
Application title was not found in manifest. Check with application vendor
Application title was not found in manifest. Check with application vendor
Application title was not found in manifest. Check with application vendor
Application title was not found in manifest. Check with application vendor
Application title was not found in manifest. Check with application vendor
Starting application [com.ami.kvm.jviewer.JViewer] ...
Cannot find Floppy wrapper library
Exception in thread "listener" java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: com.ami.iusb.FloppyRedir.GetLEDStatus()B
    at com.ami.iusb.FloppyRedir.GetLEDStatus(Native Method)
    at com.ami.iusb.FloppyRedir.ReadKeybdLEDStatus(FloppyRedir.java:543)
    at com.ami.kvm.jviewer.gui.JViewerApp.onKeybdLED(JViewerApp.java:1839)
    at com.ami.kvm.jviewer.kvmpkts.KVMClient.onControlMessage(KVMClient.java:292)
    at com.ami.kvm.jviewer.kvmpkts.CtrlReader.read(CtrlReader.java:113)
    at com.ami.kvm.jviewer.kvmpkts.KVMClient.onReadEvent(KVMClient.java:123)
    at com.ami.kvm.jviewer.communication.NWListener.run(NWListener.java:72)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:748)


and when trying to show the virtual keyboard I get:

Code:
Exception in thread "AWT-EventQueue-1" java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: com.ami.iusb.FloppyRedir.GetKeyboardName()Ljava/lang/String;
    at com.ami.iusb.FloppyRedir.GetKeyboardName(Native Method)
    at com.ami.iusb.FloppyRedir.ReadKeybdType(FloppyRedir.java:577)
    at com.ami.kvm.jviewer.gui.AutoKeyboardLayout.get_keybd_type(AutoKeyboardLayout.java:143)
    at com.ami.kvm.jviewer.gui.AutoKeyboardLayout.<init>(AutoKeyboardLayout.java:57)
    at com.ami.kvm.jviewer.gui.JVToolBar.mousePressed(JVToolBar.java:267)
    at java.awt.AWTEventMulticaster.mousePressed(AWTEventMulticaster.java:280)
    at java.awt.Component.processMouseEvent(Component.java:6536)
    at javax.swing.JComponent.processMouseEvent(JComponent.java:3324)
    at java.awt.Component.processEvent(Component.java:6304)
    at java.awt.Container.processEvent(Container.java:2239)
    at java.awt.Component.dispatchEventImpl(Component.java:4889)
    at java.awt.Container.dispatchEventImpl(Container.java:2297)
    at java.awt.Component.dispatchEvent(Component.java:4711)
    at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.retargetMouseEvent(Container.java:4904)
    at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.processMouseEvent(Container.java:4532)
    at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.dispatchEvent(Container.java:4476)
    at java.awt.Container.dispatchEventImpl(Container.java:2283)
    at java.awt.Window.dispatchEventImpl(Window.java:2746)
    at java.awt.Component.dispatchEvent(Component.java:4711)
    at java.awt.EventQueue.dispatchEventImpl(EventQueue.java:760)
    at java.awt.EventQueue.access$500(EventQueue.java:97)
    at java.awt.EventQueue$3.run(EventQueue.java:709)
    at java.awt.EventQueue$3.run(EventQueue.java:703)
    at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
    at java.security.ProtectionDomain$JavaSecurityAccessImpl.doIntersectionPrivilege(ProtectionDomain.java:74)
    at java.security.ProtectionDomain$JavaSecurityAccessImpl.doIntersectionPrivilege(ProtectionDomain.java:84)
    at java.awt.EventQueue$4.run(EventQueue.java:733)
    at java.awt.EventQueue$4.run(EventQueue.java:731)
    at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
    at java.security.ProtectionDomain$JavaSecurityAccessImpl.doIntersectionPrivilege(ProtectionDomain.java:74)
    at java.awt.EventQueue.dispatchEvent(EventQueue.java:730)
    at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpOneEventForFilters(EventDispatchThread.java:205)
    at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEventsForFilter(EventDispatchThread.java:116)
    at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEventsForHierarchy(EventDispatchThread.java:105)
    at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEvents(EventDispatchThread.java:101)
    at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEvents(EventDispatchThread.java:93)
    at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.run(EventDispatchThread.java:82)


And yes, XQuartz is running.

So I am about to give up on Mac. I really wonder how this works on my son's Mac running Mojave.
 

mgd

Dabbler
Joined
Jan 8, 2017
Messages
46
@marlon thank you for the reply. :)

I have difficulties allowing "java" to do input monitoring. This is how it looks. No “+” button. Any ideas?

EDIT: It seems there need to be at least one app in order for the “+” button to appear.
Workaround described here (https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/387333) is to install one other app that asks for permission to input monitoring and then the “+” will appear. Will try it out.

1586293424358.png
 
Last edited:
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