Facebook open-sources ReDex to hopefully lead to faster apps

The official Facebook app is one of the most ubiquitous tools on the Android market. Since so many people use the massive social media service on a daily – if not hourly – basis, it makes sense that the company would want to ensure that their app is one of the leanest and meanest among its competitors. That’s why Facebook home-brewed ReDex, a tool that reduces the size of Android apps and increases performance.

An initial reaction by some might be to scoff at this. After all, the official Facebook app is a notorious resource hog, and many users have stopped using it altogether in favor of simply accessing their feed through a mobile browser. Nevertheless, the proof is in the pudding. Although the official Facebook app is pretty clunky, imagine just how bulky it would be without ReDex. The first version of the app to be optimized with the tool shipped in November of last year, and it was 25 percent smaller than the version before it. Facebook also reports that the ReDex-modified version of their app booted up 30 percent faster than its forerunners.

Regardless of your opinion of the Facebook app, it seems like ReDex could be an invaluable tool in the hands of developers across the globe. Fortunately, today the social giant has announced that they are making the tool open source. Hopefully devs will pick it up and use it to make their apps leaner and meaner.

If you’re a developer and you’ve been looking for some utilities to make your app run more efficiently, check out Facebook’s official release of the tool over here. You can also check out the source code over on GitHub. We’ll wait around with our fingers crossed that this will lead to good things in the Android developer’s world, but in the meantime, hop down to the comments and let us know what you think of ReDex. Something you’re going to check out, or not much interest? Give us your thoughts and, as always, stay tuned to Android Authority for the latest updates on all your favorite apps.