Bundling images in a JAR file and speed problems

[Holywhippet]

I'm trying to deploy an application I've written in a JAR file. Part of the application loads in images to use as button icons. However, when I specify the path to the images I have to specify some kind of absolute path like c:\images\image.gif or /images/image.gif. That isn't an option for the JAR file version where the image files are inside of it. I tried using images/image.gif but it didn't work.

Also, my application is producing a PDF file after reading data through an ODBC connection. If I run the application by itself then all is well. If I run it after it's been put in the JAR file, the application works but takes about ten times as long to run.

Any ideas?