gistfile1.txt

$ ./perl6-j --ll-exception tools/build/install-core-dist.pl $PREFIX/share/perl6
Unhandled exception: VMArray representation does not implement bind_pos_native
  in STORE (gen/jvm/CORE.setting:29581)
  in STORE (gen/jvm/CORE.setting:28892)
  in <anon> (gen/jvm/CORE.setting:52061)
  in THREAD-ENTRY (gen/jvm/CORE.setting:51033)

FTR, this is what happens when I run the following on a fresh download of rakudo-star-2017.10:

$ perl Configure.pl --prefix=$PREFIX --gen-moar --gen-nqp --backends=jvm,moar
$ make && make install

which seemed like a reasonable thing to try to do. If the JVM backend doesn't support installing, then make install shouldn't try to install it.

IIRC the problem you've run into was fixed with rakudo/rakudo@581edd58 (after the release of rakudo-star-2017.10). With current head the JVM backend should be installable.

Unfortunately, neither 'make test' (which is only usable after 'make install') nor 'make spectest' look very good -- mostly due to the following bugs:

• the EvalServer used for 'make (test|spectest)' has a serious memory leak: https://rt.perl.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=132104
• nativecall (part of 'make test') is busted on the JVM backend: https://rt.perl.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=132102
• 'make test' does not work before 'make install': https://rt.perl.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=132101

All in all the JVM backend isn't in a particular good shape. On the other hand it's not completely broken -- it passes 51453 tests from roast.