I've created an executable from my Python GUI application, and while I managed to reduce its size from 300MB to 26MB using UPX, it still takes a long time to launch. I'm looking for advice on how to speed up the opening time or understand why it's so slow. Any help would be appreciated!
2 Answers
Reducing the size of the executable does help, but it could also be that compressing it may actually slow down the startup time. When the executable runs, it decompresses to carry out the original program. Have you checked which UI library you're using? Sometimes executables can carry unnecessary dependencies, like a bunch of extra files for rendering windows. If you're using Tkinter (which is pretty lightweight), that should help a bit, but keep an eye on other dependencies you've bundled in there. Got any ideas?
It sounds like you might be dealing with a common issue in Python executables. When you create an executable, it essentially becomes a self-extracting archive, which needs to extract itself before it can run. This can slow down the start time significantly. A possible fix is to create an installer instead, which does the extraction beforehand. That way, the executable can launch quickly without that delay. Just a thought!
But what if I want to keep everything, like my image assets, neat and tidy? I wanted the app to be portable without cluttering the installation folder.
Yeah, I'm using Tkinter along with PyInstaller and UPX for compression, but I’m worried about what’s being included in the build. Might be a good idea to double-check that!