Guide: Migrating Essential JRE from Oracle JDK to Red Hat OpenJDK
Posted: 26 May 2026, 15:03
Hi everyone,
I wanted to share a quick update and a resource with the community regarding the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) used by the Essential EA Tool Open Source edition.
By default, the standard installations and guides point toward the Oracle Java JDK. However, due to licensing preferences, organizational standards, or lifecycle management, migrating to an open-source alternative is a frequent requirement for enterprise environments.
I have successfully completed testing and migrated our Essential environment to Red Hat Java JDK (OpenJDK) - Protégé and TomCat. The setup is stable, and everything is working perfectly as expected across the stack.
To help anyone else looking to make this switch, I’ve documented the step-by-step process—including updating environment paths and ensuring configuration compatibility.
You can find the full step-by-step guide here on GitHub:
How to Change JRE in Essential EA (GitHub Repository): https://github.com/yasenstar/EA/blob/ma ... nge_jre.md
What the guide covers:
Feel free to check out the markdown file, and let me know if you have any questions or if you've done similar migrations with other OpenJDK distributions (like Temurin or Amazon Corretto). Good Luck!
Best regards,
Xiaoqi
ps. I only test this in Open Source edition, maybe someone has experience on cloud & docker edition, feel free to share.
I wanted to share a quick update and a resource with the community regarding the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) used by the Essential EA Tool Open Source edition.
By default, the standard installations and guides point toward the Oracle Java JDK. However, due to licensing preferences, organizational standards, or lifecycle management, migrating to an open-source alternative is a frequent requirement for enterprise environments.
I have successfully completed testing and migrated our Essential environment to Red Hat Java JDK (OpenJDK) - Protégé and TomCat. The setup is stable, and everything is working perfectly as expected across the stack.
To help anyone else looking to make this switch, I’ve documented the step-by-step process—including updating environment paths and ensuring configuration compatibility.
You can find the full step-by-step guide here on GitHub:
How to Change JRE in Essential EA (GitHub Repository): https://github.com/yasenstar/EA/blob/ma ... nge_jre.mdWhat the guide covers:
- Identifying default JRE/JDK configurations.
- Swapping the environment variables and paths to point to Red Hat OpenJDK.
- Verification steps to ensure the Essential Viewer / Integration Server hooks up correctly.
Feel free to check out the markdown file, and let me know if you have any questions or if you've done similar migrations with other OpenJDK distributions (like Temurin or Amazon Corretto). Good Luck!
Best regards,
Xiaoqi
ps. I only test this in Open Source edition, maybe someone has experience on cloud & docker edition, feel free to share.