The file orb.properties is defined in the IDL to Java mapping specification as
a place for the ORB to look for properties when ORB.init() is called. The
current spec in use for Merlin is ptc/00-01-08, which identifies
the directory <java.home>/lib as the only place to search for this file.
A more recent version of this spec (ptc/00-11-03) defines the search order as:

1. <user.home>
2. <hava.home>/lib

Given the much greater usefulness of being able to look for orb.properties
in the user's home directory, we will update org.omg.CORBA.ORB to add the
user's home directory to the search. Also, the internal class

com.sun.corba.se.internal.corba.ORB

incorrectly searches for orb.properties in <user.dir> which is completely
wrong (and not very useful).