Terminator / Preferences... not showing on OSX/MacOS - SOLVED

[jclerman0]

Hi, I'm using the latest Terminator build for MacOS (Package 28.130.7298): 

on Mojave (10.14.5) and found that I had a couple of issues when I started up Terminator:

1. The Preferences... menu-item (under Terminator in the menubar) was completely missing
2. The About Terminator window was not showing the above - instead it showed something very basic like "Java 1.0".  This 2nd item was reported in another thread where it was traced to the Java version used, but the Preferences... issue wasn't mentioned there and the thread has an esoteric name so I thought it best to create a new thread.

I have solved the issue in my environment.  The problem was that Terminator was using Java 1.8, which I have installed, but which it no longer really supports.  Terminator wants a later Java, and I also have Java 12 installed, but needed to make it the one Terminator uses.  I figured out that:

1. Terminator apparently calls Java from a Bash shell which it starts using the --login option (Devs: did I get that right?)
2. For another piece of software, I want Java 1.8 to be the default in my interactive shells - but I can let Java 12 be the default in non-interactive shells.
3. It is possible under MacOS to select the default java version by doing something like
   
   export JAVA_HOME=`/usr/libexec/java_home -v 1.8`

So to get all that to happen, I added the following lines in Bash startup files:

In ~/.bashrc:

# here set the Java version we want in interactive shells

export JAVA_HOME=`/usr/libexec/java_home -v 1.8`

In ~/.bash_profile:

if [ -z "$PS1" ]; then

        # This shell is not interactive (but we are here because, perhaps, bash was called with --login)

export JAVA_HOME=`/usr/libexec/java_home -v 12`

else

        # This shell is interactive

if [ -f ~/.bashrc ]; then . ~/.bashrc; fi

fi

Hopefully this will help other folks.  YMMV, batteries not included.

--Jeff L.