Long Loading Requests in App Engine for Java

In this post, I revisit the loading requests in Google App Engine for Java. The test results are shown below. The following modes are:

Skeleton

Plain-vanilla skeleton webapp with SDK (1.8.2) dependencies.

With Spring Framework Web

Skeleton webapp plus Spring Framework Web (3.2.4.RELEASE) dependencies. This adds almost 3 MB of JARs.

spring-aop-3.2.4.RELEASE.jar	335455
spring-beans-3.2.4.RELEASE.jar	607755
spring-context-3.2.4.RELEASE.jar	863688
spring-core-3.2.4.RELEASE.jar	869674
spring-expression-3.2.4.RELEASE.jar	196807
spring-web-3.2.4.RELEASE.jar	625875

With Spring Web MVC

Webapp with Spring Framework Web MVC. This add one additonal JAR.

spring-webmvc-3.2.4.RELEASE.jar

636993

With Spring Web MVC and applicationContext

Webapp with Spring Framework Web MVC and running an empty (zero beans) application context on startup via ContextLoaderListener.

With Google Guice

Skeleton webapp with Google Guice (3.0) dependencies.

With Google Guice (one servlet module)

Webapp with Google Guice servlet context listener, filter, loading a servlet module.

With Google Guice (one servlet module)

Same as before, but built without AOP. The following dependency declaration was used:

        <dependency>
            <groupId>com.google.inject</groupId>
            <artifactId>guice</artifactId>
            <version>${guice.version}</version>
            <classifier>no_aop</classifier>
            <exclusions>
             <exclusion>
              <groupId>aopalliance</groupId>
              <artifactId>aopalliance</artifactId>
             </exclusion>
            </exclusions>
        </dependency>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>com.google.inject.extensions</groupId>
            <artifactId>guice-servlet</artifactId>
            <version>${guice.version}</version>
            <exclusions>
             <exclusion>
              <groupId>com.google.inject</groupId>
              <artifactId>guice</artifactId>
             </exclusion>
            </exclusions>
        </dependency>  
  

Test Results (Summarized)

Times are measured by shutting down instance, hitting a URL, looking at request time in logs. All using a frontend instance class of F1 (600MHz, 128MB).

Mode	Average Time (ms)
Skeleton	4322.6
With Spring Web	4836.0
With Spring Web MVC	4819.0
With Spring Web MVC and applicationContext	8845.6
With Google Guice (no modules)	4437.6
With Google Guice (one servlet module)	8260.8
With Google Guice (one servlet module, no AOP)	5332.2

Observations

• Adding some JARs (dependencies) to the web application (even without using any of its classes) increases the time it takes to complete a loading request.
• Adding an empty (zero beans) application context to the web application increases the time by about 4 seconds.
• Using Google Guice to load servlets and provide dependency injection can add about 4 seconds (similar to using Spring Framework).
• Removing AOP from the use of Google Guice can lower the additional loading request time.

Test Results (Raw)

Mode	Try	Time (ms)
Skeleton	1	4050
Skeleton	2	4384
Skeleton	3	4305
Skeleton	4	4609
Skeleton	5	4265
Skeleton	Average	4322.6
With Spring Web	1	5001
With Spring Web	2	5115
With Spring Web	3	4783
With Spring Web	4	4724
With Spring Web	5	4557
With Spring Web	Average	4836.0
With Spring Web MVC	1	5205
With Spring Web MVC	2	4900
With Spring Web MVC	3	4486
With Spring Web MVC	4	5164
With Spring Web MVC	5	4340
With Spring Web MVC	Average	4819.0
With Spring Web MVC and applicationContext	1	9187
With Spring Web MVC and applicationContext	2	8946
With Spring Web MVC and applicationContext	3	8417
With Spring Web MVC and applicationContext	4	8777
With Spring Web MVC and applicationContext	5	8901
With Spring Web MVC and applicationContext	Average	8845.6
With Google Guice (no modules)	1	4578
With Google Guice (no modules)	2	4473
With Google Guice (no modules)	3	4480
With Google Guice (no modules)	4	4223
With Google Guice (no modules)	5	4434
With Google Guice (no modules)	Average	4437.6
With Google Guice (one servlet module)	1	7845
With Google Guice (one servlet module)	2	8426
With Google Guice (one servlet module)	3	8476
With Google Guice (one servlet module)	4	8394
With Google Guice (one servlet module)	5	8163
With Google Guice (one servlet module)	Average	8260.8
With Google Guice (one servlet module, no AOP)	1	5702
With Google Guice (one servlet module, no AOP)	2	5020
With Google Guice (one servlet module, no AOP)	3	6036
With Google Guice (one servlet module, no AOP)	4	5223
With Google Guice (one servlet module, no AOP)	5	4680
With Google Guice (one servlet module, no AOP)	Average	5332.2

Related Links

• Reducing Google App Engine Cold-Start Time When Using JPA
• Java instance startup time out of control - Google Groups