What is the difference between javac and the Eclipse compiler?

Question

Is Eclipse\'s Java compiler just a wrapper around the same core that the javac program is wrapped around, or is it a separate compiler altogether? If the latter

Answer 1

Eclipse's built-in compiler is based on IBM's Jikes java compiler. (Note that Eclipse also started its life at IBM). It is completely independent of Sun's Java compiler in the JDK; it is not a wrapper around Sun's javac.

Jikes has existed for a long time, it used to be a lot faster than the standard JDK Java compiler (but I don't know if that's still true). As to why IBM wanted to write their own Java compiler: maybe because of licensing reasons (they also have their own Java implementation).