JDK

Tested on a CentOS 7 minimal installation

Install

The current latest stable version is 1.8.0_77

cd /opt/
wget --no-cookies --no-check-certificate --header "Cookie: gpw_e24=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.oracle.com%2F; oraclelicense=accept-securebackup-cookie" "http://download.oracle.com/otn-pub/java/jdk/8u77-b03/jdk-8u77-linux-x64.tar.gz"
tar xzf jdk-8u77-linux-x64.tar.gz

cd /opt/jdk1.8.0_77/
alternatives --install /usr/bin/java java /opt/jdk1.8.0_77/bin/java 2
alternatives --config java

Set environment variable

add a jdk.sh file in /etc/profile.d/

With the following content

export JAVA_HOME=/opt/jdk1.8.0_77
export PATH=${PATH}:/opt/jdk1.8.0_77/bin

Logout

gnome-session-quit

Test

Test the installation by executing

java -version