> I wrote a simple tool that allows you to filter out what you don't need
It'd be a short hop from here to a tool that basically does for JDK-platform apps what Erlang's releases do for the ERTS platform: builds a new JRE (as a portable executable, not an installer) that actually contains the app and its deps in the JRE's stdlib, such that you just end up with a dir containing "a JRE", plus a runtime "boot config" file that tells the JRE what class it should run when you run the JRE executable.
With such a setup, your Java program could actually ship as an executable binary, rather than a jar and an instruction to install Java. Nobody would have to know Java's involved! :)
It'd be a short hop from here to a tool that basically does for JDK-platform apps what Erlang's releases do for the ERTS platform: builds a new JRE (as a portable executable, not an installer) that actually contains the app and its deps in the JRE's stdlib, such that you just end up with a dir containing "a JRE", plus a runtime "boot config" file that tells the JRE what class it should run when you run the JRE executable.
With such a setup, your Java program could actually ship as an executable binary, rather than a jar and an instruction to install Java. Nobody would have to know Java's involved! :)