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What is executable size anyway?
- From: Øyvind Harboe <oyvind dot harboe at zylin dot com>
- To: java at gcc dot gnu dot org
- Date: Sat, 17 Apr 2004 16:41:29 +0200
- Subject: What is executable size anyway?
- Organization: Zylin AS
"Reduce executable size" comes up as a goal from time to another,
and not only in a GCJ context.
But what is "executable size"? What is its units?
Here are a couple of suggestions:
1. seconds. How long does it take to download? Compression and bandwidth
enters the picture here as does ease of installation. GCJ applications
are generally less painful to install than e.g. Suns Java JRE(colateral
damage and side-by-side installations)
2. harddisk space. Complicated to calculate. Rarely relevant.
3. in memory footprint on PC(Windows/Linux). This is related to active
working set and hence speed of execution.
4. In embedded systems there might not be a virtual memory system, and
hence every byte counts.
To me, #1 and #4 are the only important ones.
--
Øyvind Harboe
http://www.zylin.com