Thanks to all who had suggestions. The
problem was I used "url" as a variable and 1.4
did not like it.

The following works in connecting from a windows nt 4.0 box
to a linux running 7.1. (I hava seen other posts with like
problem so just in case it would help.)

String dbUrl =
"jdbc:firebirdsql:192.168.1.2/3050:/opt/interbase/examples/employee.gdb";
Connection conn = DriverManager.getConnection(dbUrl, "sysdba", "masterkey");

Thanks expecially to Helen who always seems to take the time to try
and help everyone.

george - original problem poster.