Comparing the size of .NET applications with native code

Byte-code based languages are slowly becoming adopted in embedded domains because of improved security and portability. Another potential reason for their adoption is the reputation for smaller code size than native. This is critical in contexts in which a small memory footprint is crucial to reduce production costs. This paper compares the code size of applications compiled for .NET framework with the same natively compiled for various processors. The paper shows that the assumption of an impressive code size reduction is not reachable and it suggests that the adoption of such languages in embedded contexts be justified by additional arguments. The paper also studies the reasons for this and it compares with the compression ratios achievable for various applications through alternative techniques.