figure out a way to link against the 1.1 libraries so that people don't
inadvertently make non-1.1 (ms java) compatible code.

not a priority as of beta because 1.3+ is required, but will be once P2D is
finished.

there's also a faq item about this, once fixed, need to remove that:
If you get a "ClassCastException" when trying to run your code in a
browser, you're probably trying to run non-Java 1.1 compliant code. This
means any classes that didn't exist in java 1.1. Or, if if you're exporting
as applet, variables that are 'final int' need to be 'static final int',
otherwise they'll have trouble on a maching that only has Java 1.1
installed (i.e. running Microsoft's Java on Windows). You should also avoid
using "final" variables inside of methods, since those aren't supported by
Microsoft's VM (and that's the one most widely installed).

jikes won't do it just by setting -target to 1.1.

original report:
http://processing.org/discourse/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=Proce55ing_Software;action=display;num=1079867179

No longer an issue because we've dropped 1.1 support a long while ago.