[vtkusers] Lots of crashes when using VTK 4.2.2 from Java 1.3

[Zsolt Zsoldos]

Hi VTK users,

I'm wondering if anybody else is using a similar setup as myself
and whether you encountered the same problems as me. I've
been using VTK3.2 with JDK 1.1.6 on Linux for several years.
I have a Java control window and a separate VTK created 3D
window where I'm using interactor. With that old setup it all
worked fine, although I had to use a lot of "synchronize" statements
in Java without those I was experiencing crashes in X refresh
calls a lot, due to some code re-entrance problems.

Now, I have upgraded to VTK 4.2.2 and JDK 1.3. The problem
is that now I keep getting crashes for every refresh calls
and many other calls as well if I add/remove actors from Java
based on user actions on the Java control window.

So, basically the program starts up, 3D window appears, I get
the 3D scene rendered OK, I can rotate/zoom the 3D view.
But if there is any change orginating from a user action on the
Java control window (basically triggered by a Swing event,
which then makes some VTK calls), then the whole program
crashes. According to the Java runtime output, the problem
that occurs is:

An unexpected exception has been detected in native code outside the VM.
Unexpected Signal : 11 occurred at PC=0x4f290bf8
Function name=glXGetCurrentContext
Library=/usr/X11R6/lib/libGL.so

I am running this on Linux, using the NVidia hardware accelerated
OpenGL library, version 1.0-3123, on XFree86 version 4.2.0.
It is important to note, that the same program was running OK
with VTK3.2 and JDK1.1.6 using the same OpenGL and X version.

I'd like to know if anybody has experienced similar problems and 
what would be the solution or work-around for this.

-- 
Zsolt Zsoldos, zsolt at simbiosys.ca, http://www.simbiosys.ca/