Intel's Grove shows off Java development tool

Electronic News, June 16, 1997 by Jim Detar

In an extraordinary statement that amounts to acceptance by Intel that Java has carved a significant niche in the emerging multimedia market, Intel said its VTune product, slated to be available in August, priced at $249 per unit, "is a critical capability in migrating Java from an exciting technology to a mainstream language for ISV and corporate applications development." According to Intel, VTune can graphically depict performance bottlenecks and offer intuitive coding methodology suggestions to help programmers optimize their Java code for the Intel architecture.

In his presentation on the evolution of the PC, Dr. Grove pointed out that users desire more performance as they migrate to the visual connected PC, and Intel sees Java as a key building block. "With the expansion of visual computing, the performance of the processor, the PC, and the software must increase more than ever before," he said.

"Among new uses, we envision the PC routinely translating all types of raw data into rich 3-D models in seconds, helping users better assimilate the information at hand. Interactive business transactions, for example, conducted 'screen to screen' will combine video, realistic graphics and audio to educate or demonstrate new products or services to potential customers."

To meet those demands, PCs will need to deliver on three key elements of microprocessor performance, Dr. Grove said: floating point, multimedia and integer. Intel processors, specifically the recently-introduced Pentium II processor, target this segment. But Intel of course wants to make the Java software as compatible as possible with its x86 architecture. "Intel's goal is to make Java run best on Intel Architecture," Dr. Grove told developers. "VTune for Java helps developers keep pace with the ever increasing performance capability of the processor."

Unlike some competing profilers, Intel said, VTune is not intrusive to a programmer's code. It ostensibly looks at all active software, including the operating system, VxDs, and DLLs and examines each instruction as it executes on the Intel Architecture. It gives information on the amount of time the CPU spends in each active module and time spent between system and user modes. Through a visual and intuitive tuning methodology the programmer can also profile a processor event, such as a cache miss, and study code down to the microarchitectural level.