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.

You create a new product file via the File  New  Other  Plug-in Development  Product Configuration wizard and change it with the product configuration editor.

A product configuration must define the application to start. The commonly used applications are:

You can also use a custom application which implements the IApplication interface.

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

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

The location of the splash screen image can be changed via the osgi.splashPath parameter, and the file can be set directly 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 on Windows is called eclipse.exe and has an associated icon. To change the file name of the launcher and its icon, use the Launching tab of your product configuration. Ensure that the icons are in the correct format, otherwise they are not used.

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

The splash handlers that can be registered via the Customization part of the Splash tab are not used by Eclipse RCP applications based on the Eclipse 4 API. Additionally, the configuration in the About Dialog and the Welcome Page section on the Branding tab is not directly supported in Eclipse RCP applications. These only work for Eclipse applications using the 3.x API.

An Eclipse feature project defines a feature. You create feature projects with a wizard, similar to plug-in projects.

A feature describes a list of plug-ins and other features which form a set of related components. It has a name, a version number and, in most cases, license information.

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

Grouping plug-ins into logical units makes them easier to handle. Instead of adding many individual plug-ins to your product configuration file, you add a few features. This also makes the structure of your application more visible.

Features can be installed into Eclipse applications and are used to define Eclipse products. They can also be used as a basis for a launch configuration.

Eclipse provides several predefined features, for example, the org.eclipse.e4.rcp feature, which contains the most commonly used plug-ins for Eclipse applications.

A product can either be based on plug-ins or on features. You select this on the Overview tab of the product configuration file.

On the Contents tab of the product editor, you enter the plug-ins or features your product consists of. The Include required Features and Plug-ins automatically option adds their dependencies automatically.

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 in the feature editor.

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

The Included Plug-ins tab allows you to change the plug-ins included in the feature. To add a plug-in to a feature, use this tab. A frequent error is to add it to the Dependencies tab instead.

The Included Features tab allows you to include other features in this feature. The Dependencies tab allows you to define other features that 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 the Eclipse IDE. Exporting your product creates a folder with all required artifacts to run your application. This includes a native launcher for each platform you export for, such as Windows or Linux.

The product editor still offers a manual export, but it does not work reliably anymore, because the Eclipse platform itself is built with a command line build based on Maven. Therefore, use a Maven Tycho build to build and deploy your application. With current Tycho versions, setting up such a build for Eclipse-based applications and plug-ins requires little configuration.

If the export encounters a problem, see 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 in the exported application by adding it to the build.properties file of your application plug-in.

Create a new feature project named 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.

Currently, the com.example.e4.rcp plug-in contains the .product file. While you could leave the .product file in its current location, a typical project setup keeps the product in its own project. This is because a product defines settings for the whole application and does not closely relate to only one plug-in.

Therefore, create a new project of type General named com.example.e4.product and move the product file to this project.

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. The following entries should already be present.

Remove the com.example.e4.rcp entry via the Remove button. We want to add the feature instead of the plug-in.

Add the following feature to your product via the Add Feature…​ button.

Start your application using the product configuration file and ensure that the application starts correctly. If everything is configured correctly, the application should start as before with no visual difference.

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