NetBeans, an integrated development environment (IDE) written in Java programming language has just been updated to version 7.4 and this brief tutorial is going to show you how to install it in Ubuntu if you haven’t already done so.

This post is not one of our average posts that are written for new users. In fact, this one is mainly for developers. Folks who write applications and other programs using IDEs like NetBeans and others. If you’re a developer or someone who wants to develop applications using NetBeans in Ubuntu, continue below to learn how to install it.

NetBeans version 7.4 brings some new features including HTML 5 development for Android, IOS devices, and PHP applications, Java SE 8 support and others.

To view the complete changelog, please visit this page.

Currently NetBeans supports, Windows XP/Vista/7, Ubuntu, Mac OS X, and Solaris. Machines should have at least 2GB RAM, 1.5 free disk space and Intel, AMD and SPARC processors.

To get started, you must first install Java SE JDK. To do that, visit Java SE JDK download page and download the newest version.

After saving it, run the commands below to extract it. Remember at the time of this writing, the current version was jdk-7u45. So you may have to change the version number if it changes.

tar -xvf ~/Downloads/jdk-7u45-linux-x64.tar.gz

 

After extracting the downloaded JDK package, create a new folder using the commands below.

 

sudo mkdir -p /usr/lib/jvm/jdk1.7.0/

 

Next, move all the extracted content to the new directory you created. Remember the current version is jdk1.7.0_45. It may change in the future.

 

sudo mv jdk1.7.0_45/* /usr/lib/jvm/jdk1.7.0/

 

Next, run the commands below to enable / configure Java JDK

 

sudo update-alternatives --install "/usr/bin/java" "java" "/usr/lib/jvm/jdk1.7.0/bin/java" 1

 

Then do the same here to enable Javac.

 

sudo update-alternatives --install "/usr/bin/javac" "javac" "/usr/lib/jvm/jdk1.7.0/bin/javac" 1

 

Finally, run the commands below to do the same with javaws.

 

sudo update-alternatives --install "/usr/bin/javaws" "javaws" "/usr/lib/jvm/jdk1.7.0/bin/javaws" 1

 

To verify if Java is installed, run the commands below.

java –version

 

Now, that Java SE JDK is installed, go and download NetBeans from here.

Select Linux Download and download the package.

 

netbeans-java-ubuntu

 

After downloading it, change into the Downloads folder and run the commands below to make the file executable.

 

chmod +x netbeans-7.4-linux.sh

 

Finally, run the commands below to begin the installation.

 

sudo ./netbeans-7.4-linux.sh

 

Enjoy!

 

netbeans-java-ubuntu-1