Excelsior JET 4.5 Shrinks Java App Downloads By Up To 40%

July 19, 2006; 02:41 AM
Excelsior LLC, a technology leader in Java(tm) SE platform support for desktop and embedded systems, has announced today that its flagship product, Excelsior JET, now has the capability to substantially reduce the download size of Java applications.

A Java application itself can be quite small, but it only works on systems that have the so called Java Runtime Environment (JRE) installed. So far authors of Java applications had two options - include the JRE with their apps or ask their end users to download and install it separately.

"The request to install the JRE before installing our Fan Selector application caused confusion for many users and problems for some due to slight differences in behavior between JRE versions," said Gary Lynch, IT Manager for The Nuaire Group, a UK ventilation products manufacturer. "So we decided to include the JRE with our application."

The problem is that the latest version 5.0 of the JRE available from Sun Microsystems, the creator of the Java technology, weighs 16 megabytes. This fact effectively puts Mr. Lynch and other desktop Java developers at a disadvantage, because the JRE alone is larger than a typical desktop application written in C++. The newly released Excelsior JET 4.5 is the industry's first attempt to eliminate this disadvantage without compromising
compatibility

"We discovered Excelsior JET 4.0 back in 2005 and were instantly impressed by the performance gains it produced," continued Mr. Lynch. "Start up time was quicker and the overall feel was that of a more responsive, slicker program. We also had the added benefit of the protection from decompilation of our jars."

Excelsior JET converts platform-neutral Java code into highly optimized machine code and produces native executables for Windows or Linux that run without the JRE. Excelsior JET 4.5, released on July 7th, 2006, introduced a new global optimizer that enables Java developers to selectively optimize the standard Java library. Only the part of the library required for the application to work gets compiled to native machine code, and the rest is compressed using a very effective specialized algorithm. This results in 30-40% reduction of the application download size.

A few sample programs and popular free Java applications, such as the Azureus P2P client, optimized and packaged using Excelsior JET 4.5, are available for download from http://www.excelsior-usa.com/jetdownsize.html

Mr. Lynch went on to say: "Using Excelsior JET 4.5, we were able to considerably reduce the Fan Selector package size. The application also appears to run quicker than the 4.0 compiled version.

I wouldn't hesitate in recommending Excelsior JET 4.5 to anyone who distributes a Java application."

About Excelsior JET
Excelsior JET is a certified Java SE technology implementation designed to help accelerate Java applications, secure them against reverse engineering, and distribute Java software products without the need to use the JRE.

The complete list of improvements and new features in Excelsior JET 4.5 may be found at http://www.excelsior-usa.com/jetlatest.html

Pricing and availability
Excelsior JET 4.5 supports Windows and Linux on Intel x86 and compatible hardware. Three Editions are available: Standard, which lists for $1,200 per developer, Professional, priced from $2,300 per developer, and Enterprise, $4,500. All purchases include one year of support and upgrades.

Academic licenses are available to students and members of the faculty and staff of qualified academic institutions at much reduced prices.

No runtime fee applies to deployment of optimized applications to conventional desktop PCs and servers. Deployment to embedded systems is subject to royalties.

For more information or to download an evaluation copy, please visit our Web site at www.excelsior-usa.com/jet.html

About Excelsior
Excelsior LLC provides advanced Java-compatible solutions and software development services with particular focus on optimizing compilers, high performance runtime environments and the Java technology. Excelsior is a Java Authorized Licensee. The flagship product of the company, Excelsior JET, is a complete solution for acceleration, protection and deployment of Java applications. Founded in 1999, Excelsior is headquartered in Novosibirsk Scientific Center, Russia. To learn more about Excelsior, visit www.excelsior-usa.com.