georger: Did you do a safe start & repair permissions both before & after you installed LW? Something tells me you haven't been to the links given in this thread. There's other options.

Yes I read the thread and tried the advice listed. For the sake of some brevity I simplified my reply.

I've been looking into a few other possibilities. If this works I will do my best to post my findings here.

Ok I've got Limewire running now.

Know what the problem is?

Don't let the system updates run.

I'm running now on 10.2.4 - no upgrades whatsoever. It's as it was installed from the CDs.

Limewire launched properly, it let me configure it and let me browse the network all glitch free.

Some file must have gotten corrupted in Apple's database because when I first tried Limewire I was already upgraded to 10.2.8 via the automatic system updater that runs after install.

Anybody know Steve Jobs' phone number?
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edited for update - I tried running the upgrades once again. Only OS, Java and Quicktime upgrades, nothing else.

Sure enough, Limewire would not load and run at all under 10.2.8

More info:

I tediously went through and applied one upgrade at a time to a virgin installation of 10.2.4 to see which is causing the problem regarding Limewire.

The OS and Quicktime upgrades aren't the cause.

It's the Java 1.4.1 upgrade that causes it.

georger,

Download the standalone java update from http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=120242 and see what happens. Some of the automatic upgrades from software update cause problems.

I did this step now from the link you provided.

Then I rebooted from the startup CD and ran Disk first aid after the installation to check/repair any possible problems (I find "safebooting" with the Shift key causes me video problems, since mine is not a multi-sync monitor).

Rebooted and tried Limewire. Back to the same old problem - Limewire just bounces in the dock and refuses to launch.

Limewire definitely doesn't like Java 1.41

I think the previous version of Java was 1.31. I'll check if it is so and see if that solves me problem.

Can you open up your console and see if anything is printed out during the installation or launching of LimeWire?

It's very odd that it's failing to launch. We've tested it on that platform and it has worked fine. (My powerbook is running 10.2.8 with Java 1.4.1 and LimeWire works just fine.)

Huh? How do I get a report? I opened the terminal thing that looks like DOS.

All it says is:

I'm no programmer or developer - just a user.

Anyway....I can't uninstall Java 1.4.1 to re-install Java 1.3.1 and after days and days of trying to figure this out I'm tired of so much experimentation.

Well? Anybody?

Salut Georger, the terminal is not the console. Console is an other app found in the utilities folder. You should see some text related to LW in there. Copy and paste it here.