Dealing with the latest Java Security update for your legacy apps

Java's gotten a bad rap lately and with good reason.  It's got so many security holes that it triggered an alert last year from Homeland Security.  Since then we've been getting pretty regular updates from the folks over at Oracle.

If you happen to administer networking equipment, especially Cisco branded devices, you've no doubt run into issues that come with Java updates.  If you have to manage different generations of networking equipment, for example, there's not doubt you have to maintain multiple versions of Java to manage them.

The latest Java security update for Java, 1.7.0_51, has finally made good on a threat.  It's activated functionality that effectively blocks any Java applet that doesn't have the "security manifest" parameters enabled.

That can leave you dead in the water.  Except, if you know how to work around it.  The video below shows you how to set an exclusion for trusted connections and applets.

Remember, this is only for connections and applets that you have complete trust in.