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Difference between revisions of "The Official Eclipse FAQs"
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=== [[FAQ Chapter 1 | Chapter 1 The Eclipse Community]] === | === [[FAQ Chapter 1 | Chapter 1 The Eclipse Community]] === | ||
− | :*[[FAQ | + | :*[[FAQ What is Eclipse?]] |
:*[[FAQ 2]] What is the Eclipse Platform? | :*[[FAQ 2]] What is the Eclipse Platform? | ||
:*[[FAQ 3]] Where did Eclipse come from? | :*[[FAQ 3]] Where did Eclipse come from? |
Revision as of 10:47, 14 March 2006
The initial contents for these FAQ pages has come from The Offical Eclipse 3.0 FAQs. Permission to publish that book contents here has been gracefully offered by Addison-Wesley, publishers of the official Eclipse Series.
Note: If you want to add a new FAQ, make sure to add a new unique FAQ number, such as FAQ 132-A for an FAQ that follows FAQ 132. Think carefully where you place your FAQ, and what number you give it. People will want to make long-lasting URLs to them, so if your FAQ gets popular you will find it hard to change its name without breaking many bookmarks.
Contents
- 1 Part I The Eclipse Ecosystem
- 2 Part II The Rich Client Platform
- 2.1 Chapter 5 All about Plug-ins
- 2.2 Chapter 6 Runtime Facilities
- 2.3 Chapter 7 Standard Widget Toolkit (SWT)
- 2.4 Chapter 8 JFace
- 2.5 Chapter 9 Generic Workbench
- 2.6 Chapter 10 Perspectives and Views
- 2.7 Chapter 11 Generic Editors
- 2.8 Chapter 12 Actions, Commands, and Activities
- 2.9 Chapter 13 Building Your Own Application
- 2.10 Chapter 14 Productizing an Eclipse Offering
- 3 Part III The Eclipse IDE Platform
- 4 Where to buy the book
Part I The Eclipse Ecosystem
Chapter 1 The Eclipse Community
- FAQ What is Eclipse?
- FAQ 2 What is the Eclipse Platform?
- FAQ 3 Where did Eclipse come from?
- FAQ 4 What is the Eclipse Foundation?
- FAQ 5 How can my users tell where Eclipse ends and a product starts?
- FAQ 6 What are Eclipse projects and technologies?
- FAQ 7 How do I propose my own project?
- FAQ 8 Who is building commercial products based on Eclipse?
- FAQ 9 What open source projects are based on Eclipse?
- FAQ 10 What academic research projects are based on Eclipse?
- FAQ 11 Who uses Eclipse in the classroom?
- FAQ 12 What is an Eclipse Innovation Grant?
- FAQ 13 What Eclipse newsgroups are available?
- FAQ 14 How do I get access to Eclipse newsgroups?
- FAQ 15 What Eclipse mailing lists are available?
- FAQ 16 What articles on Eclipse have been written?
- FAQ 17 What books have been written on Eclipse?
- FAQ 18 How do I report a bug in Eclipse?
- FAQ 19 How can I search the existing list of bugs in Eclipse?
- FAQ 20 What do I do if my feature request is ignored?
- FAQ 21 Can I get my documentation in PDF form, please?
- FAQ 22 Where do I find documentation for a given extension point?
- FAQ 23 How is Eclipse licensed?
Chapter 2 Getting Started
- FAQ 24 Where do I get and install Eclipse?
- FAQ 25 How do I run Eclipse?
- FAQ 26 How do I increase the heap size available to Eclipse?
- FAQ 27 Where can I find that elusive .log file?
- FAQ 28 Does Eclipse run on any Linux distribution?
- FAQ 29 I unzipped Eclipse, but it won't start. Why?
- FAQ 30 How do I upgrade Eclipse?
- FAQ 31 How do I install new plug-ins?
- FAQ 32 Can I install plug-ins outside the main install directory?
- FAQ 33 How do I remove a plug-in?
- FAQ 34 How do I find out what plug-ins have been installed?
- FAQ 35 Where do I get help?
- FAQ 36 How do I accommodate project layouts that don't fit the Eclipse model?
- FAQ 37 What is new in Eclipse 3.0?
- FAQ 38 Is Eclipse 3.0 going to break all of my old plug-ins?
- FAQ 39 How do I prevent my plug-in from being broken when I update Eclipse?
Chapter 3 Java Development in Eclipse
- FAQ 40 How do I show/hide files like classpath in the Navigator?
- FAQ 41 How do I link the Navigator with the currently active editor?
- FAQ 42 How do I use the keyboard to traverse between editors?
- FAQ 43 How can I rearrange Eclipse views and editors?
- FAQ 44 Why doesn't my program start when I click the Run button?
- FAQ 45 How do I turn off autobuilding of Java code?
- FAQ 46 How do I hide referenced libraries in the Package Explorer?
- FAQ 47 Where do my class files disappear to?
- FAQ 48 What editor keyboard shortcuts are available?
- FAQ 49 How do I stop the Java editor from showing a single method at once?
- FAQ 50 How do I open a type in a Java editor?
- FAQ 51 How do I control the Java formatter?
- FAQ 52 How do I choose my own compiler?
- FAQ 53 What Java refactoring support is available?
- FAQ 54 How can Content Assist make me the fastest coder ever?
- FAQ 55 How can templates make me the fastest coder ever?
- FAQ 56 What is a Quick Fix?
- FAQ 57 How do I profile my Java program?
- FAQ 58 How do I debug my Java program?
- FAQ 59 How do I find out the command-line arguments of a launched program?
- FAQ 60 What is hot code replace?
- FAQ 61 How do I set a conditional breakpoint?
- FAQ 62 How do I find all Java methods that return a String?
- FAQ 63 What can I view in the Hierarchy view?
- FAQ 64 How do I add an extra library to my project's classpath?
- FAQ 65 What is the advantage of sharing the project file in a repository?
- FAQ 66 What is the function of the .cvsignore file?
- FAQ 67 How do I set up a Java project to share in a repository?
- FAQ 68 Why does the Eclipse compiler create a different serialVersionUID from javac?
Chapter 4 Plug-In Development Environment
- FAQ 69 How do I create a plug-in?
- FAQ 70 How do I use the plug-in Manifest Editor?
- FAQ 71 Why doesn't my plug-in build correctly?
- FAQ 72 How do I run my plug-in in another instance of Eclipse?
- FAQ 73 What causes my plug-in to build but not to load in a runtime workbench?
- FAQ 74 My runtime workbench runs, but my plug-in does not show. Why?
- FAQ 75 How do I add images and other resources to a runtime JAR file?
- FAQ 76 Can I add icons declared by my plugin.xml in the runtime JAR?
- FAQ 77 When does PDE change a plug-in's Java build path?
- FAQ 78 What is a PDE JUnit test?
- FAQ 79 Where can I find the Eclipse plug-ins?
- FAQ 80 How do I find a particular class from an Eclipse plug-in?
- FAQ 81 Why do I get a 'plug-in was unable to load class' error when I activate a menu or toolbar action?
- FAQ 82 What is the use of the build.xml file?
- FAQ 83 How do I prevent my build.xml file from being overwritten?
- FAQ 84 When is the build.xml script executed?
- FAQ 85 How do I declare my own extension point?
- FAQ 86 How do I find all the plug-ins that contribute to my extension point?
- FAQ 87 Why is the interface for my new extension point not visible?
- FAQ 88 Can my extension point schema contain nested elements?
- FAQ 89 How do I create a feature?
- FAQ 90 How do I synchronize versions between a feature and its plug-in(s)?
- FAQ 91 What is the Update Manager?
- FAQ 92 How do I create an update site (site.xml)?
- FAQ 93 Why does my update site need a license?
Part II The Rich Client Platform
Chapter 5 All about Plug-ins
- FAQ 94 What is a plug-in?
- FAQ 95 Do I use plugin or plug-in?
- FAQ 96 What is the plug-in manifest file (plugin.xml)?
- FAQ 97 How do I make my plug-in connect to other plug-ins?
- FAQ 98 What are extensions and extension points?
- FAQ 99 What is an extension point schema?
- FAQ 100 How do I find out more about a certain extension point?
- FAQ 101 When does a plug-in get started?
- FAQ 102 Where do plug-ins store their state?
- FAQ 103 How do I find out the install location of a plug-in?
- FAQ 104 What is the classpath of a plug-in?
- FAQ 105 How do I add a library to the classpath of a plug-in?
- FAQ 106 How can I share a JAR among various plug-ins?
- FAQ 107 How do I use the context class loader in Eclipse?
- FAQ 108 Why doesn't Eclipse play well with Xerces?
- FAQ 109 What is a plug-in fragment?
- FAQ 110 Can fragments be used to patch a plug-in?
- FAQ 111 What is a configuration?
- FAQ 112 How do I find out whether the Eclipse Platform is running?
- FAQ 113 Where does System.out and System.err output go?
- FAQ 114 How do I locate the owner plug-in from a given class?
- FAQ 115 How does OSGi and the new runtime affect me?
- FAQ 116 What is a dynamic plug-in?
- FAQ 117 How do I make my plug-in dynamic enabled?
- FAQ 118 How do I make my plug-in dynamic aware?
Chapter 6 Runtime Facilities
- FAQ 119 How do I use progress monitors?
- FAQ 120 How do I use a SubProgressMonitor?
- FAQ 121 How do I use the platform logging facility?
- FAQ 122 How do I use the platform debug tracing facility?
- FAQ 123 How do I load and save plug-in preferences?
- FAQ 124 How do I use the preference service?
- FAQ 125 What is a preference scope?
- FAQ 126 How do I use IAdaptable and IAdapterFactory?
- FAQ 127 Does the platform have support for concurrency?
- FAQ 128 How do I prevent two jobs from running at the same time?
- FAQ 129 What is the purpose of job families?
- FAQ 130 How do I find out whether a particular job is running?
- FAQ 131 How can I track the lifecycle of jobs?
- FAQ 132 How do I create a repeating background task?
Chapter 7 Standard Widget Toolkit (SWT)
- FAQ 133 What is SWT?
- FAQ 134 Why does Eclipse use SWT?
- FAQ 137 Can I use SWT outside Eclipse for my own project?
- FAQ 138 Are there any visual composition editors available for SWT?
- FAQ 139 Why do I have to dispose of colors, fonts, and images?
- FAQ 140 Why do I get an invalid thread access exception?
- FAQ 141 How do I get a Display instance?
- FAQ 142 How do I prompt the user to select a file or a directory?
- FAQ 143 How do I display a Web page in SWT?
- FAQ 144 How do I embed AWT and Swing inside SWT?
- FAQ 145 Where can I find more information on SWT?
Chapter 8 JFace
- FAQ 146 What is a viewer?
- FAQ 147 What are content and label providers?
- FAQ 148 What kinds of viewers does JFace provide?
- FAQ 149 Why should I use a viewer?
- FAQ 150 How do I sort the contents of a viewer?
- FAQ 151 How do I filter the contents of a viewer?
- FAQ 152 How do I use properties to optimize a viewer?
- FAQ 153 What is a label decorator?
- FAQ 154 How do I use image and font registries?
- FAQ 155 What is a wizard?
- FAQ 156 How do I specify the order of pages in a wizard?
- FAQ 157 How can I reuse wizard pages in more than one wizard?
- FAQ 158 Can I reuse wizards from other plug-ins?
- FAQ 159 How do I make my wizard appear in the UI?
- FAQ 160 How do I run a lengthy process in a wizard?
- FAQ 161 How do I launch the preference page that belongs to my plug-in?
- FAQ 162 How do I ask a simple yes or no question?
- FAQ 163 How do I inform the user of a problem?
- FAQ 164 How do I create a dialog with a details area?
- FAQ 165 How do I set the title of a custom dialog?
- FAQ 166 How do I save settings for a dialog or wizard?
Chapter 9 Generic Workbench
- FAQ 167 Pages, parts, sites, windows: What is all this stuff?
- FAQ 168 How do I find out what object is selected?
- FAQ 169 How do I find out what view or editor is selected?
- FAQ 170 How do I find the active workbench page?
- FAQ 171 How do I show progress on the workbench status line?
- FAQ 172 Why should I use the new progress service?
- FAQ 173 How do I write a message to the workbench status line?
- FAQ 174 How do I create a label decorator declaratively?
- FAQ 175 How do I add label decorations to my viewer?
- FAQ 176 How do I make the workbench shutdown?
- FAQ 177 How can I use IWorkbenchAdapter to display my model elements?
- FAQ 178 How do I create my own preference page?
- FAQ 179 How do I use property pages?
- FAQ 180 How do I open a Property dialog?
- FAQ 181 How do I add my wizard to the New, Import, or Export menu categories?
- FAQ 182 Can I activate my plug-in when the workbench starts?
- FAQ 183 How do I create an image registry for my plug-in?
- FAQ 184 How do I use images defined by other plug-ins?
- FAQ 185 How do I show progress for things happening in the background?
- FAQ 186 How do I switch from using a Progress dialog to the Progress view?
- FAQ 187 Can I make a job run in the UI thread?
- FAQ 188 Are there any special Eclipse UI guidelines?
- FAQ 189 Why do the names of some interfaces end with the digit 2?
Chapter 10 Perspectives and Views
- FAQ 190 How do I create a new perspective?
- FAQ 191 How can I add my views and actions to an existing perspective?
- FAQ 192 How do I show a given perspective?
- FAQ 193 What is the difference between a perspective and a workbench page?
- FAQ 194 How do I create fixed views and perspectives?
- FAQ 195 What is a view?
- FAQ 196 What is the difference between a view and a viewer?
- FAQ 197 How do I create my own view?
- FAQ 198 How do I set the size or position of my view?
- FAQ 199 Why can't I control when, where, and how my view is presented?
- FAQ 200 How will my view show up in the Show View menu?
- FAQ 201 How do I make my view appear in the Show In menu?
- FAQ 202 How do I add actions to a view's menu and toolbar?
- FAQ 203 How do I make a view respond to selection changes in another view?
- FAQ 204 How does a view persist its state between sessions?
- FAQ 205 How do I open multiple instances of the same view?
Chapter 11 Generic Editors
- FAQ 206 What is the difference between a view and an editor?
- FAQ 207 How do I open an editor programmatically?
- FAQ 208 How do I open an external editor?
- FAQ 209 How do I dynamically register an editor to handle a given extension?
- FAQ 210 How do I switch to vi or emacs-style key bindings?
- FAQ 211 How do I create my own editor?
- FAQ 212 How do I enable the Save and Revert actions?
- FAQ 213 How do I enable global actions such as Cut, Paste, and Print in my editor?
- FAQ 214 How do I hook my editor to the Back and Forward buttons?
- FAQ 215 How do I create a form-based editor, such as the plug-in Manifest Editor?
- FAQ 216 How do I create a graphical editor?
- FAQ 217 How do I make an editor that contains another editor?
Chapter 12 Actions, Commands, and Activities
- FAQ 218 Actions, commands, operations, jobs: What does it all mean?
- FAQ 219 What is an action set?
- FAQ 220 How do I make my action set visible?
- FAQ 221 How do I add actions to the global toolbar?
- FAQ 222 How do I add menus to the main menu?
- FAQ 223 How do I add actions to the main menu?
- FAQ 224 Why are some actions activated without a target?
- FAQ 225 Where can I find a list of existing action group names?
- FAQ 226 What is the difference between a command and an action?
- FAQ 227 How do I associate an action with a command?
- FAQ 228 How do I create my own key-binding configuration?
- FAQ 229 How do I provide a keyboard shortcut for my action?
- FAQ 230 How can I change the name or tooltip of my action?
- FAQ 231 How do I hook into global actions, such as Copy and Delete?
- FAQ 232 How do I build menus and toolbars programmatically?
- FAQ 233 How do I make menus with dynamic contents?
- FAQ 234 What is the difference between a toolbar and a cool bar?
- FAQ 235 Can other plug-ins add actions to my part's context menu?
- FAQ 236 How do I add other plug-ins' actions to my menus?
- FAQ 237 What is the purpose of activities?
- FAQ 238 How do I add activities to my plug-in?
- FAQ 239 How do activities get enabled?
- FAQ 240 What is the difference between perspectives and activities?
Chapter 13 Building Your Own Application
- FAQ 241 What is an Eclipse application?
- FAQ 242 How do I create an application?
- FAQ 243 What is the minimal Eclipse configuration?
- FAQ 244 How do I create a Rich Client application?
- FAQ 245 How do I customize the menus in an RCP application?
- FAQ 246 How do I make key bindings work in an RCP application?
- FAQ 247 Can I create an application that doesn't have views or editors?
- FAQ 248 How do I specify where application data is stored?
- FAQ 249 Can I create an application that doesn't have a data location?
- FAQ 250 What is an Eclipse product?
- FAQ 251 What is the difference between a product and an application?
- FAQ 252 How do I distribute my Eclipse offering?
- FAQ 253 Can I use an installation program to distribute my Eclipse product?
- FAQ 254 Can I install my product as an add-on to another product?
Chapter 14 Productizing an Eclipse Offering
- FAQ 255 Where do I find suitable Eclipse logos and wordmarks?
- FAQ 256 When do I need to write a plug-in install handler?
- FAQ 257 How do I support multiple natural languages in my plug-in messages?
- FAQ 258 How do I replace the Eclipse workbench window icon with my own?
- FAQ 259 How do I write my own eclipseexe platform launcher?
- FAQ 260 Who shows the Eclipse splash screen?
- FAQ 261 How can I publish partial upgrades (patches) to my product?
Part III The Eclipse IDE Platform
Chapter 15 Text Editors
- FAQ 262 What support is there for creating custom text editors?
- FAQ 263 I'm still confused! How do all the editor pieces fit together?
- FAQ 264 How do I get started with creating a custom text editor?
- FAQ 265 How do I use the text document model?
- FAQ 266 What is a document partition?
- FAQ 267 How do I add Content Assist to my editor?
- FAQ 268 How do I provide syntax coloring in an editor?
- FAQ 269 How do I support formatting in my editor?
- FAQ 270 How do I insert text in the active text editor?
- FAQ 271 What is the difference between highlight range and selection?
- FAQ 272 How do I change the selection on a double-click in my editor?
- FAQ 273 How do I use a model reconciler?
Chapter 16 Help, Search, and Compare
- FAQ 274 How do I add help content to my plug-in?
- FAQ 275 How do I provide F1 help?
- FAQ 276 How do I contribute help contexts?
- FAQ 277 How can I generate HTML and toc.xml files?
- FAQ 278 How do I write a Search dialog?
- FAQ 279 How do I implement a search operation?
- FAQ 280 How do I display search results?
- FAQ 281 How can I use and extend the compare infrastructure?
- FAQ 282 How do I create a Compare dialog?
- FAQ 283 How do I create a compare editor?
Chapter 17 Workspace and Resources API
- FAQ 284 How are resources created?
- FAQ 285 Can I create resources that don't reside in the file system?
- FAQ 286 What is the difference between a path and a location?
- FAQ 287 When should I use refreshLocal?
- FAQ 288 How do I create my own tasks, problems, bookmarks, and so on?
- FAQ 289 How can I be notified of changes to the workspace?
- FAQ 290 How do I prevent builds between multiple changes to the workspace?
- FAQ 291 Why should I add my own project nature?
- FAQ 292 Where can I find information about writing builders?
- FAQ 293 How do I store extra properties on a resource?
- FAQ 294 How can I be notified on property changes on a resource?
- FAQ 295 How and when do I save the workspace?
- FAQ 296 How can I be notified when the workspace is being saved?
- FAQ 297 Where is the workspace local history stored?
- FAQ 298 How can I repair a workspace that is broken?
- FAQ 299 What support does the workspace have for team tools?
Chapter 18 Workbench IDE
- FAQ 300 How do I open an editor on a file in the workspace?
- FAQ 301 How do I open an editor on a file outside the workspace?
- FAQ 302 How do I open an editor on something that is not a file?
- FAQ 303 Why don't my markers show up in the Tasks view?
- FAQ 304 Why don't my markers appear in the editor's vertical ruler?
- FAQ 305 How do I access the active project?
- FAQ 306 What are IWorkspaceRunnable, IRunnableWithProgress, and WorkspaceModifyOperation?
- FAQ 307 How do I write to the console from a plug-in?
- FAQ 308 How do I prompt the user to select a resource?
- FAQ 309 Can I use the actions from the Navigator in my own plug-in?
- FAQ 310 What APIs exist for integrating repository clients into Eclipse?
- FAQ 311 How do I deploy projects to a server and keep the two synchronized?
- FAQ 312 What is the difference between a repository provider and a team subscriber?
- FAQ 313 What is a launch configuration?
- FAQ 314 When do I use a launch delegate?
- FAQ 315 What is Ant?
- FAQ 316 Why can't my Ant build find javac?
- FAQ 317 How do I add my own external tools?
- FAQ 318 How do I create an external tool builder?
Chapter 19 Implementing Support for Your Own Language
- FAQ 319 What is eScript?
- FAQ 320 Language integration phase 1: How do I compile and build programs?
- FAQ 321 How do I load source files edited outside Eclipse?
- FAQ 322 How do I run an external builder on my source files?
- FAQ 323 How do I implement a compiler that runs inside Eclipse?
- FAQ 324 How do I react to changes in source files?
- FAQ 325 How do I implement an Eclipse builder?
- FAQ 326 Where are project build specifications stored?
- FAQ 327 How do I add a builder to a given project?
- FAQ 328 How do I implement an incremental project builder?
- FAQ 329 How do I handle setup problems for a given builder?
- FAQ 330 How do I make my compiler incremental?
- FAQ 331 Language integration phase 2: How do I implement a DOM?
- FAQ 332 How do I implement a DOM for my language?
- FAQ 333 How can I ensure that my model is scalable?
- FAQ 334 Language integration phase 3: How do I edit programs?
- FAQ 335 How do I write an editor for my own language?
- FAQ 336 How do I add Content Assist to my language editor?
- FAQ 337 How do I add hover support to my text editor?
- FAQ 338 How do I create problem markers for my compiler?
- FAQ 339 How do I implement Quick Fixes for my own language?
- FAQ 340 How do I support refactoring for my own language?
- FAQ 341 How do I create an Outline view for my own language editor?
- FAQ 342 Language integration phase 4: What are the finishing touches?
- FAQ 343 What wizards do I define for my own language?
- FAQ 344 When does my language need its own nature?
- FAQ 345 When does my language need its own perspective?
- FAQ 346 How do I add documentation and help for my own language?
- FAQ 347 How do I support source-level debugging for my own language?
Chapter 20 Java Development Tool API
- FAQ 348 How do I extend the JDT?
- FAQ 349 What is the Java model?
- FAQ 350 How do I create Java elements?
- FAQ 351 How do I create a Java project?
- FAQ 352 How do I manipulate Java code?
- FAQ 353 What is a working copy?
- FAQ 354 What is a JDOM?
- FAQ 355 What is an AST?
- FAQ 356 How do I create and examine an AST?
- FAQ 357 How do I distinguish between internal and external JARs on the build path?
- FAQ 358 How do I launch a Java program?
- FAQ 359 What is JUnit?
- FAQ 360 How do I participate in a refactoring?
- FAQ 361 What is LTK?