How can I give my Java application a unique process name?

Question

I've noticed that when I start Netbeans it shows up in the task manager as netbeans.exe as all my own Java applications show up as java.exe or javaw.exe.

How can I change that so my process names shows up as myapp.exe?

I asked a similar question: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1057247/how-can-i-set-the-process-name-for-a-java-program — Mnementh, Jul 20 '09 at 08:45

score 19 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 20 '09 at 08:37

19

The process name is the name of the JVM. So if you rename the jvm you have an other process name. There are some tools which can do that for you. For example Launch4J

answered Jul 20 '09 at 08:37

Luzifer42

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score 11 · Answer 2 · edited Oct 31 '17 at 14:20

11

IMO the best option is to choose one of the many open source launchers. They all provide a nicer deployment container than java.exe and a batch file.

I've compiled a list of them after a brief search on google (in no particular order and may not be exhaustive):

NSIS
~~Janel~~ (dead link)
JSmooth
Launch4J
WinRun4J

(full disclosure: i work on winrun4j)

edited Oct 31 '17 at 14:20

answered Jul 20 '09 at 19:11

Peter Smith

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winRun4j --is available as a plugin for eclipse and very easy to handle. Also tried launch4j its good one but cannot change the name of myApp.exe through it.Although thanks for workable sorted list of open source launchers. – Sagar G. Sep 04 '13 at 15:42
WunRun4J and JSmooth don't seem to be maintained any longer – Oct 31 '17 at 14:19
NSIS is for building installers, not lauchers. – gunslingor May 06 '19 at 17:54

Brian Agnew · Answer 3 · 2009-07-20T08:49:29.307

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Not easily. The easiest way (but not nice!) would be to simply copy the java.exe (only 68k on my system, so perhaps practical!)

If you're worried about identifying which java process is which (e.g. is one consuming memory/CPU etc.), use the standard tool jps to identify the Java processes

edited Jul 20 '09 at 08:49

answered Jul 20 '09 at 08:40

Brian Agnew

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I have done this with the java.exe I use to run eclipse with - then I can easily spot whether eclipse is chewing up resources, or my program. – RodeoClown Jul 21 '09 at 05:08
One copy the java.exe. But how does one change the process name? – Yster Oct 10 '16 at 07:54
Perhaps copy java.exe to myjava.exe (for starters...) – Brian Agnew Oct 10 '16 at 11:25

score 5 · Answer 4 · answered Jul 20 '09 at 08:37

5

Netbeans and Eclipse both ship with an .exe file that in turns launches a JVM. The exe itaself probably does nothing after launching the VM. You see the NetBeans javaw.exe in the Task Manager also, I suspect.

So you'll need to write a native exe (using some windows tool) that does a similar thing.

answered Jul 20 '09 at 08:37

skaffman

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I believe javaw.exe is also the launcher Eclipse. – Thomas Owens Jul 20 '09 at 19:15

score 1 · Answer 5 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:09

1

Just answered this a second ago here: Get JVM to grow memory demand as needed up to size of VM limit?

It's actually a lot easier than folks are saying (but you do have to have a c/c++ compiler handy).

edited May 23 '17 at 12:09

Community

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answered Jul 21 '09 at 04:45

Kevin Day

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score 1 · Answer 6 · answered Jan 08 '14 at 04:55

There are mainly 2 approaches: one is as already described: using tools like Launch4j, WinRun4J to create native Windows launchers.

Another approach that seems better is to use Apache Procrun to wrap the java application as a Windows service. During the install service process, we can give the process an meaningful name such as OurApp.exe.

All we need do is rename prunsrv.exe to OurApp.exe and replace every occurrence of prunsrv.exe in our install|start|stop|uninstall service scripts to MyApp.exe.

See more from Using Apache Procrun to Rename Process Name of a Java Program in Windows

How can I give my Java application a unique process name?

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