Automated code splitting and pre-fetching for improving responsiveness of browser-based applications

Abstract

A 'code splitting tool' provides various techniques for automatically analyzing and rewriting existing browser-based applications to introduce dynamic code loading into those applications thereby improving perceived application responsiveness. Structural elements of application code (including functions, classes, etc.) are broken into small 'stubs' with corresponding bodies. Rewritten applications then initially transfer only the portion of the code (including some combination of stubs and bodies) to the client as necessary for initial application execution. Additional stubs and/or bodies are then transferred either on-demand at runtime or in the background. Automated code rewriting proceeds without requiring any application-specific knowledge or changes to existing code prior to code rewriting. Further, the code splitting tool can tailor code rewriting to specific computing devices (computers, PDA's, cell phones, etc.), specific network conditions, and/or specific users, through an automated training process that creates clusters that control code downloads to optimize perceived application responsiveness.