• Select snapshots
  The objects comparison compares two snapshot files. In this step, you select the first and the second snapshot file for the comparison. The combo boxes contain all snapshot files that have been added to the snapshot selector. The first and second snapshot files must be different.
• Recording type
  In this step, you choose whether you want to compare
  • All objects
    This option only yields results if both compared snapshots were profiled with Java 1.5 or higher (JVMTI). If one of the compared snapshots was profiled with Java 1.4 or lower (JVMPI), selecting this option will generate an empty comparison.
  • Recorded objects
    Only objects that were recorded will be compared when this option is selected.
• View parameters
  In this steps you can select aggregation and liveness mode (only for recorded objects), just as for the all objects view and the recorded objects view.

• the name of the class
• the size in the second snapshot file minus the size in the first snapshot file
• the instances in the second snapshot file minus the instances in the first snapshot file

The second column incorporates a bidirectional bar chart. Increases are painted in red and to the right, while decreases are painted in green and to the left. In the view settings dialog you can choose whether you want this bar chart to display absolute changes or the percentage of the change. The other value is displayed in parentheses. This setting also determines how this column is sorted.