Table of Contents

Preliminaries
Starting eclipse
Creating a simple application
Exiting Eclipse
Zipping up your program
Bringing your program home

Overview

A workspace is a directory containing some eclipse-specific files that contain information used by the eclipse system. A workspace can contain one or more projects. When you start eclipse, you choose a specific workspace. All of the projects in the workspace are available to you and you can easily switch among the projects in the workspace. You can create one workspace for all of the project in your course or you can divide them into several workspaces. For example, in CS 1713, you will create separate workspaces for your labs (recitations), programming projects, and class projects.

Preliminaries:

• "Click on" means move the mouse cursor over the item and press and release the left mouse button.
• Similarly "Right click on" means move the cursor over the item and press and release the right mouse button. The right mouse button usually brings up a menu of properties for the selected item.
• "Click and hold" means hold the left mouse button down while you drag the mouse. For example "Click and hold on A->B" means move the mouse to A, hold down the left mouse button while dragging the mouse to B, then release.
• Do not double click (two quick left mouse presses) unless explicitly indicated.

To access items through a menu (e.g. the File menu appearing on the top bar of the main window), left click on the menu item. A pull-down menu will appear. Move the cursor over the action you want (e.g. New Project) and left click. In the handout we will describe this sequence as "Select the New Project option on the File menu".

Starting eclipse:

• If you have not already done so, create a few directories to hold you workspaces. For example, if you are on the CS network and taking CS 1713, create a CS1713 directory under Z:\working\java and under that create three directories as follows:
  labs
  classes
  projects
  
• Assuming that eclipse has already been installed on your system and that there is an eclipse icon on your desktop, double click on this icon.
• A Workspace Launcher window should appear and you will be asked to choose a workspace.
• Click on Browse.... This will open a Select Workspace Directory window. Navigate to a workspace directory such as Z:\working\java\cs1713\classes. Click OK.
• Click OK in the Workspace Launcher.
• In a few seconds (or minutes) a window should appear with the title Java - Eclipse SDK. There should be 6 icons in this window. As you move your mouse over these, a description will appear. Find the one with the description Workbench. Click on this once.
• The main Java eclipse development window will appear.
• If all goes well, you should see a window that looks something like Figure 1, below.

Figure 1: The Eclipse Java Development Perspective

Creating a simple application

• Select File -> New -> Java Project ->. Fill in the Project Name as gettingstarted (all lower case).
• Under Contents, Create new project in workspace should be selected.
• Make sure that under Project Layout you have chosen Create separate source and output folders.
• Click Finish
• This has created a gettingstarted subdirectory in your workspace. This directory will containing everything you need for this project.
• Create a HelloWorld class by selecting File -> New -> Class. This will bring up a New Java Class window. The source folder should have been filled in with gettingstarted/src. Full in simpleproject as the Package. Use HelloWorld as the Name. Pay attention to upper and lower case when you type, as Java is case-sensitive. The Modifiers should be public and check the box: public static void main ... .

  Now click Finish.

  You should see something like Figure 2, below.

  
  Figure 2: The HelloWorld class has been created

• Eclipse has created an empty class called HelloWorld:
• Delete the comment lines and insert a line so that the main method looks like this:

  public static void main(String[] args) {
     System.out.println("Hello world, my name is YOURNAME");
  }
  

  Replace YOURNAME with your name.
• We are now ready to run the program. The are several ways to do this. The simplest way is to find the name of the class in the Package Explorer. The Package Explorer is labeled Package Ex in Figure 2, and the class HelloWorld is highlighted.
• Right click on HelloWorld and choose Run As -> Java Application
• A Save and Launch window may pop up. If it does, select Always save resources before launching (so this does not pop up again) and click OK. You should see the output in the Console window at the bottom of the screen as in Figure 3.
  
  Figure 3: The HelloWorld program after it has been run

  Exiting Eclipse

  Exit eclipse with File -> Exit

  Zipping up your program

  You will need to zip up your project to submit it for a grade. It is also useful to zip it up to transport it to home, or to just save it on a USB drive. Although the Z drive is backed up nightly, you should get in a habit of backing up your import files, such as programs that you stayed up all night working on.i

  One way to zip up you project is to open an explorer window in you workspace directory. There will be a directory for each project in that workspace. Zip up a project by right clicking on the project directory (in this case gettingstarted) and choose Send To -> Compressed (zipped) Folder
  This will produce a small zip file called gettingstarted.zip which you can drag to you USB drive to take home. The file should only be about 2 KB in size. Do not zip up your workspace directory. The workspace directory contains a subdirectory which is about 8 MB in size.

  Bringing your program home

  So now you have a zip file containing your project. How do you get this back into eclipse on your home machine?
  • Start up eclipse and choose a workspace to use.
  • Go into the workbench as before.
  • File -> Import
  • This will bring up an Import window.
  • Open up General and select Existing Projects into Workspace and click Next
  • Click Select archive File, browse, and select the zip file. Click Open.
  • Click Finish in the Import window.
  • You should see the gettingstarted project in the Package Explorer.
  • Click on the + to open it up.
  • Under this, open src -> simpleproject
  • You should see HelloWorld.java
  • Double click on this to bring it into the editor.
  • Right click as before to run it.

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