Junos Pulse Client won't start on Mac 10.10 / Yosemite

[tkb]

Hi,

I've gone through an hour of troubleshooting with our support team but I still can't log into our corporate network via the usual method which is:

1) Go to mycorporate.url
2) Enter credentials and log in
3) Wait for Junos Pulse client to launch and establish VPN
4) Open RDC and connect to my desktop in the office

Basically, it's failing at step 3, my credentials are accepted, I get a Java popup asking if I'd like the java application to run and then I get a beachball which eventually leads to either Firefox (latest build) or Safari (latest build) to hang and require a force quit.

Things I've tried:

- Install latest Oracle JDK (currently running JDK 8u65) and have cleared temporary files from the Java control panel + added my corporate login site to the "Exception site list" for good measure. Java confirmed running and java -version gives me:

[code]
java version "1.8.0_65"
Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.8.0_65-b17)
Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM (build 25.65-b01, mixed mode)
[/code]

- I've also tried the old Apple JDK with exactly the same results.

- Installed latest Firefox, set Java Applet plugin to "always allow" running

- Juniper Networks SetupClient 7.2 is what got downloaded when I first tried to log in, this is what's installed

- All firewalls / port blockers (e.g. Little Snitch) switched off

When I look at the console log, I can see a couple of java related messages including:

[code]
11/5/15 11:18:17.171 AM java[873]: java.lang.NullPointerException
at sun.awt.SunToolkit.getSystemEventQueueImplPP(SunToolkit.java:1090)
at sun.awt.SunToolkit.getSystemEventQueueImplPP(SunToolkit.java:1085)
at sun.awt.SunToolkit.getSystemEventQueueImpl(SunToolkit.java:1080)
at java.awt.Toolkit.getEventQueue(Toolkit.java:1734)
at java.awt.EventQueue.invokeLater(EventQueue.java:1264)
at sun.plugin2.main.client.MacOSXKeyHandler.notifyFlagsChangedFromNative(Unknown Source)

[/code]

and (which doesn't seem to affect launching when I run javaws manually)

[code]
11/5/15 11:13:38.731 AM java[873]: objc[873]: Class JavaLaunchHelper is implemented in both /Library/Internet Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin/Contents/Home/bin/java and /Library/Internet Plug-Ins/JavaAppletPlugin.plugin/Contents/Home/lib/jli/./libjli.dylib. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.

[/code]

Any other ideas or debugging steps I should be trying?

[Filbert]

Set Java Applet plugin to "run in unsafe mode" instead of "always allow".

[tkb]

I just tried setting thins to run untrusted in Safari (and found "Always allow", the closest thing in Firefox) and the result is the same, log in fine, but beachball when waiting for Junos Pulse to fire up.

[jbeakley]

Setup Client 7.2 is very, very old. Is there a way you can convince your system administrator to upgrade your Pulse Secure gateway to a newer version, perhaps 8.1?

Pulse Connect Secure 7.2 is associated with Pulse 2.0 (I think that's right), which predates OSX 10.10 by some time.

Did you ever have this working? I would be surprised if this could be made to work.

[zanyterp]

If you login through Pulse, does it work?
Launching through a browser is only supported on Safari; but using Pulse is more efficient (especially on newer Mac OS X versions)

[tkb]

Hi, not sure what you mean by "login through pulse" - i don't have a separate pulse app I can launch, the only way that has worked for me in the past is to connect to "access.mycompany.org/mac" and after authentication, Junos Pulse fires up.

Actually, I just got something working.. I managed to find an old version of the "Network Connect" app and pointed it at my company's gateway URL and it worked. I can RDC into my desktop fine.

[tkb]

Thanks, I passed this onto my company's IT folks in case it helped. It's weird actually, I have 2 Macs both running 10.10, this one with Java 8 is having the problems but when I checked the other one which connects fine, it's running a build of Java 7. I tried putting Java 7 on this one and.... same problem.

And as mentioned in another reply, I just got something working.. I managed to find an old version of the "Network Connect" app and pointed it at my company's gateway URL and it worked. I can RDC into my desktop fine.

Would still like to be able to connect with the latest supported tools / utilities and will post any updates if I have them.