Bundling images in a JAR file and speed problems

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?

Use the class loader's getRessource function, it can load from within a JAR file.

I've tried that. I've been following the examples here: http://java.sun.com/docs/books/tutor...misc/icon.html

None of them work for me. I've got the right version of the JRE but it just won't load the images no matter what.

Here is code that will attemot to load from an external file, then a JAR'd file if it can't be found in the first case, one issue we've had with it is that repeatedly loading teh images is time consuming, adding a weak hashmap to store the name vs image in means you can store them all and retreive them easier next time...

Code:

---

        private static BufferedImage loadImage(String name) {
                InputStream in;
           
                // First try the classloader
                in = ImageLoader.class.getResourceAsStream(name);
         
                // check to see
                if(in == null) {
                        // Are we instead looking at a filename?
                        try {
                                FileInputStream fis = new FileInputStream(name);
                    //        It's open!
                                in = fis;
                        } catch(FileNotFoundException foe) {
                    //        we give up!
                                return null;
                        }
                }
               
                if(in != null) {
                        try {
                                try {
                                        return ImageIO.read(in);       
                                } finally {
                                        in.close();
                                }
                        } catch (IOException e) {
                                e.printStackTrace();
                        }
                }
                return null;
        }

---

Thanks that code works fine for me. The images aren't loaded very often and there are only about five of them so I won't need a hashmap.

Thanks again.