[jmhe]

can you run this simple java code from command line and tell me what's the output is? that's exactly how installer gets uid:

import java.io.*;
public class uidtest {
  public static void main(String[] args) {
    com.sun.security.auth.module.UnixSystem unix = new com.sun.security.auth.module.UnixSystem();
    System.out.println(Long.toString(unix.getUid()));
  }
}

you can paste the code into a text file called uidtest.java, then

$ javac uidtest.java
$ java uidtest