Shrinking Your Jars - Size Matters

Gerald Bauer <[email protected]> Mon, 12 May 2003 09:33:36 -0700 (PDT)
Newsgroups gmane.comp.java.jnlp.announce
Message-ID <[email protected]>
Hi,

  I collected some links in case you want to shrink
your Web Start apps download time/size by shrinking
your apps jars using massive renaming to shorter names
(aka obfuscation); purging of unused fields, methods
and more; or turning compression to the max.

  Here are my picks. Enjoy.

   - Gerald

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Retrologic RetroGuard
---------------------

RetroGuard is a free, open-source jar compressor
(obfuscator); highly-configurable using scripts for
fine-tuning obfuscation/renaming; GNU LGPL licensed;
headed by Mark Welch

More info @
http://www.retrologic.com/retroguard-main.html


--------
ProGuard
--------

ProGuard is a free, open-source jar compressor
(obfuscator); grew out of RetroGuard; includes Ant
task; GNU GPL licensed; headed by Eric Lafortune

More info @ http://proguard.sourceforge.net or
http://sourceforge.net/projects/proguard


---------------------------
jarg - Java Archive Grinder
---------------------------

jarg is a free, open-source 100 % Java jar compressor;
jarg removes unused fields, methods, classes and and
more; renames fields, methods, classes and so on to
shorter names; optimizes your bytecode; and turns
compressing to the max; includes Ant task; BSD
licensed; headed by Hidetoshi Ohuchi (Japan)

More info @ http://jarg.sourceforge.net or
http://sourceforge.net/projects/jarg


------------------------------------------------
Java Spec #200: Network Transfer Format for Jars
------------------------------------------------

New Supercompressed Java Class File Format (aka Pack)
for Java 1.5 (aka Tiger)

More info @ http://jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=200


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More Links
----------

Eric Lafortune (of ProGuard fame) keeps track of
alternative jar shrinkers and obfuscators @
http://proguard.sourceforge.net/alternatives.html

DMOZ Java Obfuscator Chapter @ http://directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Programming/Languages/Java/Development_Tools/Obfuscators/


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