I have been trying to get the Australian Tax Office (ATO) software to work on various flavours of Linux with mixed results. For those struggling with the thought of having to find a PC install Windows, etc, etc, there is a Linux solution written in Java, and it seems to work relatively well.
For those who know the Australian tax system they will understand, as for the rest here is what this software is used for, in simple terms.
This is the software that most businesses are required to use, (those who have chosen to do it themselves), to do there online quarterly or annually “Business Activity Statements”, (BAS),
for the Australian Goods & Services Tax (GST), that needs to be submitted online through out the fiscal year, which for Australia the Fiscal year is from 1st July, one year, to the 30th June the next.
(Note: I have done this on all the Linux variants I have tested, so for me it works well.)
So for this version of Mint Linux (13), I happily share my experiences on how I got it to work.
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Mint 13
32 Bit Version Only
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Requirements:
1. Linux (Mint 13) my preferred (obviously)…! If you have googled your way here, then you too can have this extraordinary version of Linux Mint from here… 
http://www.linuxmint.com/oldreleases.php
2. Oracle (Sun) JavaTM Standard Edition Runtime Environment (32bit), you can get this here, make sure you download the “NON RPM 32bit” version.
http://www.java.com/en/download/manual.jsp#lin
3. ATO Linux Software (this link is given after you apply for registration with the ATO).
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Mint 13
32 Bit Version Only
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I will assume you have “Mint version 13” installed and up and running or as a new installation, and the required items 2 & 3, have been downloaded to your “Downloads Folder”.
I will try and supply screen-shots if I can, (although not required), just follow these steps and check everything as you go along for typo’s.
This will be pretty much the way we will run all the way through this process.
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Tips…..
–Opening a Terminal Session Window,
(Menu > Applications > Accessories > Terminal), (Menu > Terminal),
or (Alt + F2 > mate-terminal).
–Once you open a “Terminal Session Window” leave it open so you dont have to constantly open new ones.
–You to use the “Up & Down Arrow” keys to recall commands, to save you having to re-type commands.
Just recall the command you require, backspace to erase the part you dont need, or left /right arrow to get to the part of the of the command you wish to edit, and then you can use the “insert” key and just typing over, but then don’t forget to turn off the “insert”, once you have finished editing by just pressing the “insert” key again.
NOTE: I will be using ONLY the Oracle (Sun) Java JRE, as you dont really need Oracle (Sun) Java JDK,
but you if you feel you require it, I would suggest you follow “dudko” tutorial, and just make sure you replace the default install directory to “/usr/java”).
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Step 1 – Un-install Mint Default JAVA JRE
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Mint 13
32 Bit Version Only
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We need to un-install the standard Java that got installed with Mint, and install the Oracle (Sun) Java JRE, you can also look at “Koja’s”tutorial for this.
1. Open a Terminal Session,
(Menu > Applications > Accessories > Terminal), (Menu > Terminal), or (Alt + F2 > mate-terminal)
2. Copy / Paste or Type, the following lines of code/commands into the terminal session window, (check for typo’s), and then press enter.
First we are going to remove every openjdk package including icedtea-plugin, so after you press enter it will ask you for the root password, enter it an it will continue, get used to it, as it will prompt you for root password a few times through out this whole tutorial.
>sudo apt-get update && apt-get remove openjdk-6-jre
Take note that it will tell you that Libreoffice needs openjdk, so your Mint Linux will automatically install openjdk-7 dependencies.
“Done Panic !”
Thats not going to be a problem for what we are going do in this tutorial, “remember this is Linux”, we can have a few versions of Java installed and choose the one we need to use.
TUX is a truly multi talented and tough Penguin, he can handle it, so if prompted just agree and accept in order to continue.
3. Let clean up all unnecessary packages, (these will be removed), only because we should, and that it’s recommended:
>sudo apt-get autoremove && apt-get clean
Done…
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Step 2 – Install Oracle (Sun) JAVA SE JRE
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Mint 13
32 Bit Version Only
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Download the “tar.gz”Java JRE package for Linux from www.java.com and make sure you download the file to the “Downloads” folder.
(DO NOT download the RPM!!).
Here is the link to the Java website download page–> Oracle (Sun) Java SE JRE
1. In your terminal session window (Alt + F2 > mate-terminal), run the command thats create a new sub-folder in the directory “/usr” called java “/usr/java”.
2. We are going to keep it the way the ATO Software requires it, create a java directory.
>sudo mkdir -p -v /usr/java
3. Go to your download folder (where you have downloaded java), & unpack it to the created sub-folder.
>cd ~/Downloads
>tar -zxvf jre-7u40-linux-i586.tar.gz
(make sure the filename is the correct version, this was the version current at time of creating this tutorial)
4. Now move it into the /usr/java directory, I use this directory “/urs/java”, because the installation script that comes with the ATO Software for Linux, assumes thats where the java files are, and will place its required files during the installation into this directory.
(if this is not setup this way the software will return an error, I think they believe there’s only on flavour of Linux out there…!)
It took me some time to work out why mine wasn’t working. Look, there might be a better way of doing this but this works well for the “Mint Linux 13”
>sudo mv -v jre1.7.0_40 /usr/java
5. The last step is to make the new JRE as default: (Check that your Java version is active)
>sudo update-alternatives –install “/usr/bin/java” “java” “/usr/java/bin/java” 1
>sudo update-alternatives –set java /usr/java/bin/java
Done…
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Step 3 – Install the Firefox Plugin
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Mint 13
32 Bit Version Only
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1. Make for every user in his home directory a subfolder:
>mkdir -v ~/.mozilla/plugins
2. Create a symbolic link, so Firefox knows where to find the java plug-in.
>sudo ln -s /usr/java/lib/i386/libnpjp2.so ~/.mozilla/plugins/
3. Now you have to restart the browser and check in Firefox if the installation has been succeeded.
4. Launch the bowser and type the following into the address bar
“ about:plugins”
5. Now lets set a maximum amount of disk space for the cache to something real.
(I will let you choose, but I normally make it less than half the default setting.)
>/usr/java/bin/ControlPanel
6. Last but not least, click on settings under temporary Internet files and set amount the disk space to 50MB, or what ever you feel is good for you.
REMEBER: You will need to setup both the “plugins link” and the “temporary internet files” for every user account on this computer.
Done…
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Step 4 – Install ATO Software
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Mint 13
32 Bit Version Only
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Once you have registered and been sent the download link, do the following.
1. Unpack the archive AUSkey_software_for_Linux.zip to “Downloads/ato”.
>cd Downloads/ato
(you can read the licence file here by using the file manager and opening it in any text reader, Pluma, LibreOffice-Writer, etc)
>Downloads/ato/ABR_PKG/Resources/Licence.rtf.
2. Now, the fun begins. There is an install script located in the “Downloads/ato/ABR_PKG/Resources” directory:
“Downloads/ato/ABR_PKG/Resources/linux_install.sh”
3. To run the script so we can install the ATO Software we need to open a terminal session window (Applications > Accessories > Terminal), and do the following:
change directory to the script location,
>cd Downloads/ATO/ABR_PKG/Resources
make it executable,
>sudo chmod a+x linux_install.sh
and then run it using the following command
>sudo ./linux_install.sh
(You will need to make sure you are sudo-ed for these commands to function, so prepare to be asked for a password. )
Done…
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Now just monitor the installation for any errors, you will see the install does the following things:
1. Adds the third party jars as well as KeystoreBE.jar in ABR_PKG/componentto the system Java library extension directory , that we created and setup previously. (the libraries to be installed can be examined in ABR_PKG/component.).
“/usr/java/packages/lib/ext”
IF there is a standard sun-java5 JRE installed these jars are ALSO copied to
“/usr/lib/jvm/java-5-sun/jre/lib/ext”
(Java 1.6 and above can use the system wide location.)
2. Creates a directory AUSkey in the user’s home directory, and copies a default
log4j properties file to that directory
“/home/$USER/AUSkey/log4j.properties”
3. Optional Extra
If you wish you can create a Firefox Profile just for this use only like I have done, that way you only go to this profile when you need to.
To run “Firefox Profile Manager” , open a terminal session window (Applications > Accessories > Terminal), and do the following:
>firefox -profilemanager
choose create new profile, call it “ATO_Only”, (you can call the profile anything you like, this is just what I have done), and just accept the defaults, clicking “next” so you can continue creating the profile and launching “Firefox” with this profile.
Now to launch “Firefox” with this profile you created for use with the ATO, just type the following command in the terminal session window.
>firefox -P ATO_Only
Now you can make this easier by creating a “Desktop Icon”, and editing the command to match the one we just used.
3a. Creating A Firefox Desktop Icon.
(Applications > Internet > (right mouse click on)> Firefox), choose “add to desktop” or “add to panel”.
Once this is done you can “right mouse click” on the “Firefox Icon” and replace the command to match the profile we created.
This is what the edited “Desktop Launcher” should look like, and you can “Name” it anything you like.
REMEBER:
You can create as many Firefox profiles as you like, but you will need to setup “Plugins, Bookmarks, Extensions, etc”, for every profile you create.
Done…
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I hope this saves you one big headache, and helps you get the ATO Software installed and working on your “Linux Mint 13”, system. Like I stated earlier, there probably is another way, but this is what I found worked best for me, and if you find any issues please let me know.
Thanks
Credits & Extracts:
“dudko” for the Java JDK Install Process
“Koja”for the Java JRE Install Process
Thanks guys for those. I will be using parts of these for this tutorials. 
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