A product configuration file (product) defines the configuration of an Eclipse application. This includes icons, the splash screen, and the necessary plug-ins and features.

The Eclipse IDE allows you to create new product files via the File  New  Other  Plug-in Development  Product Configuration wizard and provides an editor to easily change the file.

A product configuration must define the main application class. The default applications for Eclipse applications are:

Custom applications implementing the IApplication interface can also be used.

On the Overview tab of this editor, you can start the product. Pressing the Synchronize link writes the relevant product configuration information into the plugin.xml file.

On the Contents tab, you define the set of plug-ins and features that are included in the final application.

The Splash tab allows you to specify the plug-in that contains the splash screen.

The launcher splash screen image can be in any of the following formats: PNG, JPG, GIF, or BMP. Transparency and animation are not supported.

The name is predefined as splash.EXTENSION and must be located in the root of the plug-in directory. Therefore, you need to put one of the following files into the project main directory:

The predefined name and location of the splash screen image can be changed via the osgi.splashPath parameter, while the file name can be changed with the -showsplash path_to_file option.

You can configure the launcher name and icon for your product. The launcher is the executable program that is created during the deployment of the product. A launcher is platform-specific. For example, the default launcher is called eclipse.exe on the MS Windows platform. This launcher also has an associated icon. To change the name and the icon, select the Launching tab of your product configuration.

Here, you can specify the file name of the launcher and the icon that should be used. Make sure the format of the icons is correct; otherwise, Eclipse will not use them.

In the Launching Arguments section, you can specify parameters for your Eclipse application and arguments for the Java runtime environment. Program Arguments are parameters passed to the Eclipse application.

Currently, the splash handlers that can be registered via the Customization part of the Splash tab are not supported by modern e4-based Eclipse RCP applications. Additionally, the configuration in the About Dialog and the Welcome Page section on the Branding tab is not directly supported in Eclipse 4 RCP applications.

Earlier releases of Eclipse supported a manual export via the product file, and these options are still present in the user interface. Unfortunately, this does not work reliably in newer releases.

Therefore, you are advised to create a Maven Tycho command-line build for building and deploying your application. With the latest Tycho version, setting up a build for Eclipse-based applications and plug-ins can be done very efficiently. == Using features

Using the Eclipse wizards you can create feature projects, similarly on how you create plug-in projects. An Eclipse feature project contains features.

A feature describes a list of plug-ins and other features which can be seen as a set of related components. It also has a name, a version number and in most cases a license information assigned to it.

A feature is described via a feature.xml file. The following listing shows an example of such a file.

The grouping of plug-ins into logical units makes it easier to handle a set of plug-ins. Instead of adding many individual plug-ins to your product configuration file, you can group them using features. That increases the visibility of your application structure.

Features can be used to install them into Eclipse applications and for the definition of Eclipse products. Features can also be used as basis to define a launch configuration.

Eclipse provides several predefined features, e.g., the org.eclipse.e4.rcp for Eclipse RCP applications.

A product can either be based on plug-ins or on features. This setting is done on the Overview tab of the product configuration file.

On the Contents tab in the product editor, you enter the plug-ins or features your products consists of.

A product does not perform automatic dependency resolution. If you add a feature to your product and want to add its dependencies, press the Add Required button.

You can create a new feature project via the File  New  Other…​  Plug-in Development  Feature Project menu entry.

If you open the feature.xml file you can change the feature properties via a special editor.

The Information tab allows you to enter a description and copyright related information for this feature.

The Included Plug-ins tab allows you to change the included plug-ins in the feature. If you want to add a plug-in to a feature, use this tab. A frequent error of new Eclipse developers is to add it to the Dependencies tab.

The Included Features tab allows you to include other features into this feature. Via the Dependencies tab you can define other features which must be present to use this feature.

The Build tab is used for the build process and should include the feature.xml file. The last two tabs give access to the configuration files in text format.

An Eclipse application needs to be exported (also called: deployed) to run outside of Eclipse. Exporting your product creates a folder with all required artifacts to run your application. This includes a native launcher specific to the platforms, e.g., Windows or Linux, you have exported it for.

Earlier releases of Eclipse supported a manual export via the product file and these options are still present in the user interface. Unfortunately this does not work reliably in newer releases.

Therefore, you are advised to set up a Maven Tycho command-line build for building and deploying your application. With the latest Tycho version setting up a build for a small RCP application can be done within a few minutes.

If the export encounters a problem please have a look into the following table for a solution:

Add a splash screen to your application. For this create or download a splash.bmp bitmap file.

Add the splash.bmp file to the main directory of your application. You can copy and paste it into the Package Explorer or Project Explorer view.

On the Splash tab of your product configuration file, define that your application plug-in contains the splash screen.

Start your application from the Eclipse IDE and verify that the splash is displayed.

Configure that the splash.bmp file is included into the exported application by adding it to the build.properties file of your application plug-in.

Create a new feature project called com.example.e4.feature via the File  New  Other…​  Plug-in Development  Feature Project entry. The following screenshot shows the first wizard page.

Include the com.example.e4.rcp plug-in into the new feature.

While you could leave the .product file in its current location, a command line build will expect it in a separate project. Create therefore a new project of type General named 'com.example.e4.product' and move the product file to this project.

Also ensure that the ID field is set, this is also required for a command line build.

Ensure that the .product file is open. Select the Overview tab and ensure the plug-ins and features option is selected.

Switch to the Contents tab in your product editor. Add the following features to your product via the Add…​ button.

Start your application via the product configuration file and ensure that the application starts correctly.

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