Android App created by Delphi XE5 starts very slow

Question

I have developed a few Android apps with Android SDK using Java and now that XE5 is out and i am a very experienced Delphi developer i tried a few samples off android apps and my impression is that android apps designed with XE5 runs very slowly, they start very slowly, almost 4 secs with a black screen, that ruins the whole experience.

I know XE5 Android apps run in native code, one more reason for this not happening, they should be extremely fast

Is there anything i can do about it?

I am using a Samsung Galaxy S2 to test, so it's not about the testing equipment.

Solution

They are a bit slow to load due to the size of the native library that is loaded into memory to run.

Make sure you are running a release build on a new, capable device and it's not so bad.

But you'll always have a large native library, as things currently stand.

One possible course of action is to distract the user by use of a splash screen. This, however, is not straightforward. However it is feasible. It will be documented somewhere or other in a week or so.

Comments

[Admin]

This is a deal breaker, users don't want an app that starts in 4secs, even google says this: "Generally, 100 to 200ms is the threshold beyond which users will perceive slowness in an application" so i guess i will wait for a decent Delphi for Android development and stick with Eclipse and Java

[blong]

If you like Pascal, but don't like the Delphi solution, do try out a trial edition of Oxygene for Java from RemObjects. That directly targets the Dalvik VM and works exactly like Java, however the language is Object Pascal, and the IDE is Visual Studio. If interested, there's an 18 month old getting started tutorial for it at blong.com/Articles/OxygeneForJavaIntro/OxygeneForAndroid.htm

[Admin]

Thanks blong i will check it out, i really like Object Pascal :)

[Marcus Adams]

We use FireMonkey for Windows/Mac, but we develop natively for iOS/Android.

[Chris Thornton]

Is there a sample "Hello, World!" compiled delphi sample app on the play store, or something else simple that I could download to try? I'm intrigued, maybe enough to purchase the XE5 mobile pack thing, but not if it's going to be too bloated and slow to be marketable.

[Admin]

Chris Thornton, here is an apk that i compiled from a XE5 sample, dropbox.com/s/rkshm1u7gx7bijr/…

[Chris Thornton]

Thanks @Mike. 6MB wow. I see the blackscreen delay, and it's actually 4-5 seconds for me, likely due to the "Lookout" (security) scan on my GS3.

[Chris Thornton]

So here I was thinking that it would be great if Android could include the runtime library, then a little voice in my head told me that I'm asking for "VBRunTime DejaVu all over again". So I guess this is probably useful for niche apps, or trial balloons to see how your app would look/act on Android or IOS, before investing in full-blown native development on that platform. I expect that the eventual list of "Popular Commercial (ANDROID) Apps Developed In Delphi" is going to be a short list. :-(