google = win. ec2.micro+ubuntu+openjdk= fail.

I tried to install OpenJDK on an Amazon EC2 micro instance. The terminal stopped echoing. The machine wasn't taking new ssh connections. I checked the system log---a kernel panic! Charming. I rebooted. Same deal. I stopped the instance and brought it up a few seconds later, thinking it might send me to a new dom-0 host. Tried the install again. Nope, same issue.

Then I typed "ec2 micro kernel panic" into Google. Third hit:

William's Blog | Like running with scissors, only more dangerous

Apparently installing OpenJDK using apt-get on Ubuntu 10.04 on an AWS EC2 Micro instance causes a kernel panic. I don't know why, and apparently neither ...

Here's the official bug report. The problem has something to do with the VM system. The workaround is to boot any other kind of instance (say, small), install java on that, then shut it down, change it to micro, and boot it. My workarounds would be to use another JRE like cacao or jamvm (too bad neither of them successfully runs the Google Closure Compiler, which was the point of putting Java on the micro instance), or just do the compilation elsewhere.

Hey, at least Google still works.