Thanks Max and Snjezana for the explanation. I have several concerns:

• when I provide wrong URL in -Djboss.runtime.directory.url= I do not see any error or warning in the log. I think user should be notified about this.
• when the file points to wrong URL and I want to download the runtime I get the expected error (wrong URL) + the following error

  An internal error occurred during: "Download 'Portlet Bridge".
  Invalid thread access
  
  org.eclipse.swt.SWTException: Invalid thread access
  	at org.eclipse.swt.SWT.error(SWT.java:4282)
  	at org.eclipse.swt.SWT.error(SWT.java:4197)
  	at org.eclipse.swt.SWT.error(SWT.java:4168)
  	at org.eclipse.swt.widgets.Display.error(Display.java:1210)
  	at org.eclipse.swt.widgets.Display.checkDevice(Display.java:752)
  	at org.eclipse.swt.widgets.Display.getShells(Display.java:1987)
  	at org.eclipse.ui.internal.progress.ProgressManagerUtil.getModalShellExcluding(ProgressManagerUtil.java:284)
  	at org.eclipse.ui.internal.progress.ProgressManagerUtil.getDefaultParent(ProgressManagerUtil.java:338)
  	at org.eclipse.ui.internal.Workbench$71.getShell(Workbench.java:3883)
  	at org.jboss.tools.project.examples.dialog.DownloadRuntimeDialog.getActiveShell(DownloadRuntimeDialog.java:518)
  	at org.jboss.tools.project.examples.dialog.DownloadRuntimeDialog.downloadAndInstall(DownloadRuntimeDialog.java:455)
  	at org.jboss.tools.project.examples.dialog.DownloadRuntimeDialog.access$5(DownloadRuntimeDialog.java:360)
  	at org.jboss.tools.project.examples.dialog.DownloadRuntimeDialog$7.run(DownloadRuntimeDialog.java:348)
  	at org.eclipse.core.internal.jobs.Worker.run(Worker.java:54)

• when I remove -Djboss.runtime.directory.url= property from the ini file the runtime still appears on the download page

Shoul I create separate Jiras for these?