Strange download agent problem and even stranger solution

I'm installing Matlab R2013b and lots of toolboxes on the headnode of a computing cluster. When I try to download all licensed packages Firefox seems to ignore it.

So I opened a terminal and tried from the command line and get:

[joe@orca ~]$ javaws ./download_agent 

(<unknown>:28028): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: g_object_notify: assertion `G_IS_OBJECT (object)' failed
Segmentation fault

My next step was to update the JDK from 1.6 to 1.7. Same results.

Now comes the really strange part:

I Googled the problem and one of the suggestions was to run javaws -verbose, I thought to help track down the problem. However when I did that "javaws -verbose ./download_agent" it worked. Printed out a lot of stuff to the terminal but the installation proceeded normally.

Anyone have any idea what is happening?

Here's my info:

|>> ver
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MATLAB Version: 8.2.0.701 (R2013b)
MATLAB License Number: ••••••
Operating System: Linux 2.6.32-279.el6.x86_64 #1 SMP Thu Jun 21 07:08:44 CDT 2012 x86_64
Java Version: Java 1.7.0_11-b21 with Oracle Corporation Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM mixed mode
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MATLAB                                                Version 8.2        (R2013b)
Simulink                                              Version 8.2        (R2013b)
Bioinformatics Toolbox                                Version 4.3.1      (R2013b)
Communications System Toolbox                         Version 5.5        (R2013b)
Control System Toolbox                                Version 9.6        (R2013b)
Curve Fitting Toolbox                                 Version 3.4        (R2013b)
DSP System Toolbox                                    Version 8.5        (R2013b)
Embedded Coder                                        Version 6.5        (R2013b)
Global Optimization Toolbox                           Version 3.2.4      (R2013b)
Image Acquisition Toolbox                             Version 4.6        (R2013b)
Image Processing Toolbox                              Version 8.3        (R2013b)
Instrument Control Toolbox                            Version 3.4        (R2013b)
MATLAB Coder                                          Version 2.5        (R2013b)
MATLAB Compiler                                       Version 5.0        (R2013b)
Mapping Toolbox                                       Version 4.0        (R2013b)
Optimization Toolbox                                  Version 6.4        (R2013b)
Parallel Computing Toolbox                            Version 6.3        (R2013b)
Partial Differential Equation Toolbox                 Version 1.3        (R2013b)
Signal Processing Toolbox                             Version 6.20       (R2013b)
SimDriveline                                          Version 2.5        (R2013b)
SimElectronics                                        Version 2.4        (R2013b)
SimEvents                                             Version 4.3.1      (R2013b)
SimHydraulics                                         Version 1.13       (R2013b)
SimMechanics                                          Version 4.3        (R2013b)
SimPowerSystems                                       Version 6.0        (R2013b)
Simscape                                              Version 3.10       (R2013b)
Simulink Coder                                        Version 8.5        (R2013b)
Simulink Control Design                               Version 3.8        (R2013b)
Simulink Design Optimization                          Version 2.4        (R2013b)
Stateflow                                             Version 8.2        (R2013b)
Statistics Toolbox                                    Version 8.3        (R2013b)
Symbolic Math Toolbox                                 Version 5.11       (R2013b)
>>|

The Distro is Scientific Linux 6.4 (very similar to CentOS)