Interaction of JVM with x86, Sparc and MIPS

A Java class is a perfect example of architecture independent code. A Java program can be compiled on a MIPS R4400 based Indy workstation running Irix 6.5 and the generated class executed on an Intel Pentium III based Windows 95 system with no problems. This independence is possible, because any system claiming to support Java implements a Java Virtual Machine (JVM). This paper presents a detailed analysis of the interaction of a JVM with three popular processor architectures – the Intel x86, the Sun UltraSparc and the SGI MIPS. The analysis shows that each architecture performs better than the other two in some aspects, but no one architecture is the “best ” for Java programs.