I got a couple of comments on my post about shrinking XAP sizes here. I haven't been able to follow up as quickly as I would have liked due to a couple of large projects I'm working on in addition to preparing for MIX'09.
The crux of the comments were to use a tool like ComponentOne XapOptimizer, which can be found here: http://labs.componentone.com/XapOptimizer/
I tested it on a couple of projects, and it seems to give me about the equivalent reduction in archive size as unzipping and rezipping the XAP package. It appears to be another great tool to add to your arsenal, although you may be able to squeeze out some additional space by optimizing the graphics in your application prior to utilizing XapOptimizer. Definitely worth checking out.
Entries (RSS)
February 20th, 2009 at 7:53 am
Hi Jeff.
Just to clarify: The XapOptimizer reduces Xap size in three ways.
1) Removal of unused classes/resources. Of course, you would never deliberately add stuff that you don’t use to a project. But many projects use libraries that contain a large number of classes, and they only need/use a few. One good example is C1.Silverlight.dll, the original motivation for creating the XapOptimizer. This is by far the most important feature of the XapOptimizer.
2) Obfuscation. In addition to protecting your IP, obfuscation reduces code size by shortening identifier names.
3) Better zip compression.
You said the reduction in your tests is about equivalent to unzipping and re-zipping. This is probably because your tests did not use any third party libraries.
I hope you find this information useful. And thanks for trying the XapOptimizer.
February 27th, 2009 at 4:27 am
Great Component!! Didn’t knew the One XapOptimizer! Great article! I’ve wrote an article about Silverlight too:
Silverlight
Regards,
Mark