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Browsing by Author "Coelho, Ricardo Jorge Gonçalves"

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  • Evaluating Ballerina's impact on performance and elasticity in distributed applications: a comparison with Java
    Publication . Coelho, Ricardo Jorge Gonçalves; Azevedo, Isabel de Fátima Silva
    Nowadays, there are many programming languages, some quite versatile and others developed for a specific purpose [1]. Ballerina, a new programming language recently launched, is, according to its development team, an innovative language designed specifically for the development of cloud applications [2]. Although Ballerina has emerged on the market as a solution for the development and integration of distributed applications [3], aspects such as its performance and elasticity compared to more traditional languages in application development remain slightly explored. As such, its impact as a language and platform for developing these applications is still unknown, along with its potential and limitations. Furthermore, in one of its most recent versions, it was announced that the language supports the creation of native GraalVM executables, promising “performance improvements and a reduction in start-up times” [4], aspects which, apart from being very promising, have not yet been examined to draw a concise conclusion. In response to these gaps, this study analysed the impact of Ballerina as a language and platform for developing applications compared to a more traditional programming language, Java. An open-source project, based on a microservices architecture, was migrated to Ballerina in order to collect data from both the original and newly migrated applications. Performance and elasticity tests determined that, with the use of GraalVM and Ahead-Of-Time (AOT) compilation, Ballerina applications were able to improve their start-up times by around 90% and their performance in aspects such as response times, throughput and resilience in managing greater number of simultaneous users. In addition, Ballerina applications were able to outperform Java applications in various scenarios, particularly under high-load conditions. Based on the results obtained, it was concluded that the use of Ballerina brings several advantages in terms of performance and elasticity, which makes it an option to be considered for both application development and integration.
    2024-10-04Master thesis Open access Show more