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robbietop

Suspended
Original poster
Jun 7, 2017
876
1,167
Good Ol' US of A
Hello all,

I found a few older threads from a couple of years back but much has changed in two years for MacOS.
I work in a virtualized lab where we use Juniper connections to VPN in (Network Connect).

I saw that Yosemite and JRE 7 broke this very old and unsupported piece of software. We'd get another Windows PC but I mouthed off about how a Mac can run Windows in a VM. So, here we are budget be damned.

The JNC VPN client and server app both need to be version 4.2. Juniper VPN is being replaced in the next two years so any changes are out of the question as EOS internally.

Issues experienced:
  1. Going through Safari to VPN page works until login. Network connect loads Java, and asks to upgrade to the precise version on the server (24401 to 28099). We had it installed already. When you click Cancel, the downloader times out and fails the connection. When you click upgrade, it downloads, and then goes to install. You then get a Warning "An error occurred while extracting one of Network Connect components."
    1. IT said this is because of the Yosemite break a couple of years back when Oracle abandoned this software for Junos Pulse. Junos Pulse is not supported by our IT, but if it works...it works. On this machine it does not work. It just hangs for twenty minutes before telling me I am a loser.
  2. If you delete JNC, then you need to redownload it from the VPN access page. When you go through the Safari https page, it should download, right? Nope. A Runtime Exception is thrown on java.lang.reflect.InvocationTargetException.
    1. I have disabled everything from System Integrity Protection to adding in a fake VeriSign certificate. IT thinks it is because the software JNC is asking for High Sierra to do something it does not do anymore (access to /System/Library). SIP still does not allow access. Rolling back to JRE 1.6.0 does not either.
    2. I have the old copy of Network Connect saved so I can reinstall it from a DMG. However, I cannot get the most recent one as IT just doesn't care. "It's a Mac. Unsupported on our network." They're following policy, which is locked in on an AD/Windows environment.
  3. Other browsers don't even acknowledge Java's existence. Chrome is useless as is Firefox Quantum and Firefox 56.2 ESR.
If you think it is impossible to get this thing up and running, please do let me know.
I'd like to show those who made this decision that we should just budget for a new Windows PC for QA, rather than fiddle with software that broke a long time ago in Mac OS.
 
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