Startup question

[Michael Sullivan <michael espersunited com>]

Does /etc/profile when the system starts up or does it only execute when
a user logs in?  I need to set my JAVA_HOME variable for Tomcat when the
system starts up.  In my /etc/rc.d/rc.local file I have:

JAVA_HOME=/usr/local/java.sdk
export JAVA_HOME

but when I try to startup Tomcat from the command line as root I get:

The JAVA_HOME environment variable is not defined
This environment variable is needed to run this program


I "echo $JAVA_HOME" and it give me blank lines, as if $JAVA_HOME was
never set.  I am doing this right, aren't I?