[OSM-newbies] osmcut throughs errors

[ivom]

http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/User:Computerteddy
posts a tool to cut up a big osm file into a smaller set of files, which 
would like to use.

however running with:
user at host:~/projects/gps/osm/mparty$ java -version
java version "1.5.0_13"
Java(TM) 2 Runtime Environment, Standard Edition (build 1.5.0_13-b05)
Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM (build 1.5.0_13-b05, mixed mode)

the tool throughs some strange errors.:
user at host:~/projects/gps/osm/mparty$ java -jar osmcut.jar 1 data.osm 
/var/tmp
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.StringIndexOutOfBoundsException: 
String index out of range: -13
         at java.lang.String.substring(String.java:1768)
         at osmcut.OsmCut.main(OsmCut.java:144)

Anybody has overcome this problem? Alas, the source is not available to 
try and find out what the problem is.

Ivo