This is more a brain-dump kind of post for me, so I do not forget, every time I need to re-install Eclipse for whatever reasons, to install the plugins I need the most (and where to find them) or to tweak it a little bit. Since my daily work is more Java-based, the tools I use are Java-centric.
Bash Tool
I tend to write a lot of shell code too, maintenance scripts for the servers or for repetetive tasks, and since I’m mostly working with Java and Eclipse, I needed something that could decently handle bash files inside Eclipse.
ShellEd comes to the rescue (the website is pretty basic, with not a lot of info). I didn’t look deeply into other shell plugins for Eclipse, but this one works nicely.
To use it, it is necessary to install also the LinuxTools Eclipse plugin (from here). The only necessary part of that set of tools, if C/C++ development and the other Linux integrations are not necessary, is the man pages viewer. ShellEd is able to present you with man pages of the shell commands in a hoover-help fashion (even if I find it tad slow).
To install, download the zip file, and from Help → Install New Software → Add, use the Archive button to install it.
Editing Sessions
At work I might be working or looking on different projects, with different set of files each, and I tend to work focused on the task at hand, trying not to pollute the screen with other distractions, even in the terms of files from another project. I was looking for an easy way to save and restore the “editing session”, the open files.
I find the Extended VS Presentation plugin to be very useful in this (info here).
Pretty simple to install in Eclipse via the “Help → Install New Software“, and then pasting in the “Work with” text-box this URL: http://andrei.gmxhome.de/eclipse/
Python
From time to time I also write some Python code, and as for shell code, I prefer to not move from the environment I’m used. For Eclipse there is a powerful plugin for Python: PyDev. Installation instructions are very well written.
Static Analysis
Other tools that for me are a must have, are a set of static analysis tools. The more useful:
- PMD: Eclipse instructions are here;
- FindBugs: installable via the Eclipse Market;
- CodePro Tools: comes from Google, and it is more than a static code analysis tool: can calculate code metrics, is a code coverage tool, has JUnit integration and can generate unit tests automatically. Can’t live without this.
Speed Eclipse a Little Bit
And this is my Eclipse configuration file, I find Eclipse a little bit faster at startup (make a copy of your old one if you want to use this!):
-showlocation
-nosplash
-startup
plugins/org.eclipse.equinox.launcher_1.2.0.v20110502.jar
--launcher.library
plugins/org.eclipse.equinox.launcher.gtk.linux.x86_64_1.1.100.v20110505
--launcher.XXMaxPermSize
256m
-vm
/usr/lib/jvm/java-1.6.0-openjdk/bin/java
-vmargs
-Xverify:none
-XX:+UseParallelGC
-XX:+AggressiveOpts
-XX:ParallelGCThreads=2
-XX:-DontCompileHugeMethods
-XX:MaxInlineSize=1024m
-XX:FreqInlineSize=1024m
-Dosgi.requiredJavaVersion=1.5
-XX:MaxPermSize=256m
-Xms512m
-Xmx1024m
-Xss2m
-server