Companies ranging from small Java start-up to Big Blue work to speed up the platform June 25, 1998 — Java performance and the time it takes developers to get their Java programs out the door and into the marketplace are two areas that are being addressed by new tools from Metamata Inc. and IBM Corp.Java startup Metamata and IBM’s alphaWorks have both posted technologies designed to help developers identify and fix code inconsistencies and speed time to market.Metamata, a new company started by former Sun Microsystems Inc. Laboratory employee Sriram Sankar, is focusing on providing performance tuning and a code quality suite, according to company officials. Meanwhile, Java Application eXtractor (JAX), which is a Java application tool that reduces the distribution size of a Java application, is available on IBM’s alphaWorks site (see Resources).Both Metamata tools and IBM’s JAX are written entirely in Java, unlike similar offerings from many vendors that were originally written in and for C++ programs, according to officials at IBM.“Java brings its own set of unique problems that are completely different from C++,” said Sankar, president and CEO of Metamata. However, IBM’s JAX remains a technology rather than a product, and the company has not yet decided when it will become a product, according to Chris Bahr, manager of the IBM alphaWorks research site.“JAX is designed to reduce the size and complexity of a Java application by enabling developers to identify and remove invalid code from that application,” Bahr said.Meanwhile, IBM has also posted to the Web its Jikes Applet Dashboard, a performance analysis tool for Java applications. Jikes Applet Dashboard enables developers to view how many CPU cycles are being taken up by a particular application and therefore pinpoint problem areas in order to fix bottlenecks. Similarly, Metamata’s tools assist in removing unwanted code, according to officials at the company. To achieve this extraction, Metamata offers Metamata Browse, a source code browser; Debug, a Java debugger; Audit, a static analysis tool; and Metrix, a measurement tool, according to Metamata officials.“All our tools are designed to fit on top of popular Java integrated development environments,” Sankar said.Although Metamata has explored static analysis in its current offering, the company will be concentrating on offering Java profiling in the near future, according to officials at the company. Currently, vendors such as the Toronto-based KL Group offer profiling tools through JProbe. Additionally, Intel has a wide range of performance tools that are targeted at helping both ISVs and developers improve Java performance on the Intel platform, in its VTune product set.“Anybody writing more than 100 lines of Java code should think about using productivity tools,” Sankar said. Technology Industry