In this bunch of articles, I'll develop a complete, feature-rich RCP application. RCP stands for Rich Client Platform.
It's a term coined by the Eclipse guys. When Eclipse 3.0 took shape, they realized that they had solution for many common problems which one has when developing a client application (ie. something which doesn't run inside a web browser).
For the first few tutorials, you just need Eclipse (Java IDE) itself. Go to the download index. Eclipse is actually a whole bunch of projects in various status of stability, so don't feel frigthened by the amount of links you'll see.
We will use 3.2M5a, the latest milestone at the time of writing. If you find something better (3.2M6, for example), use that.
That's a beta version of Eclipse 3.2 which will be release in June.
If you worry about beta software: Are you using software from the guys in Seattle? So what are you complaining about?
So get the latest "3.2 Stream Stable Build" or "Latest Release" if I forget to update this section over summer.
You will be presented an even more complicated page. Take a deep breath, calm down, have a look into the "Eclipse SDK" section. Here, you can find versions of Eclipse for different systems (platforms). Search yours and get the version of Eclipse for it.
You have Java installed, right? If not, follow the instructions on the page to get it, too.
To install Eclipse, just unzip the archive anywhere. That will create a now folder "eclipse" and put everything in there.
Then, start "eclipse.exe" in that folder.
EMF (Eclipse Modeling Framework) will help us to build the data model for our application.
There are several ways to get EMF into Eclipse, we'll use the most simple one: the Update Manager.
In the Help menu (who would have guessed), you'll find "Software Updates". Try "Search and Install...".
We want "Search for new features to install".
On the next page, there can be an item "Callisto Discovery Site". Callisto is one of the aforementioned projects. Callisto is a kind of super-project which tries to synchronize the release of ten Eclipse project this summer. Good luck, guys!
For us, that means that we can find almost anything we'd ever dream of in one place. Thanks, guys!
So if Callisto isn't there, add it: "New Remote Site..."
Name: Callisto Discovery Site
URL: http://download.eclipse.org/callisto/releases
Make sure it's selected and click "Finish".
Go into the eclipse preferences, type "proxy" into the filter.
Fill in the correct values. If necessary, Eclipse will ask you for your username and password when opening a connection.
Don't select everything. That would mean an almost 1GB download.
Expand "Callisto Discovery Site", then "The Eclipse Tools Project". Select "EMF 2.2.0" and finish the wizard.
Read and accept the license, wait for the download to finish and install the files.
Eclipse will offer to restart. Click Ok.