How to install a custom plug-in in Eclipse Ganymede?

Question

Hi,

We have a custom plug-in. That is, the company where I'm working developed it in house. I would like to install it as an available plug-in in Eclipse Ganymede. How do I do that?

From what I can figure out, the Eclipse software install only supports installation from Eclipse software update sites.

I went to Help -> Install New Software... -> Add -> Local... to browse to a folder containing the plug-in. Although the dialog lets me add the directory as an update site, it doesn't work. It expects that directory to be a local Eclipse update site (I think). I get the error

No repository found at file:/G:/TOOLS/...

Next I just copied the plug-in into the plug-in directory under my Eclipse installation. That didn't work either. I also tried copying it into the dropins directory. No dice.

Can anyone enlighten me how to install a plug-in that's not on an "update" site?

Thanks in advance....

Answer 1

Usually an Eclipse plug-in packaged as zip file is install by extracting it into the Eclipse installation directory (or the plugins directory depending on how it is packaged, as it can also extract files in features directory).

Next restart Eclipse with the --clean option.

Answer 2

Did you check the Eclipse error log? Maybe the bundle is failing to deploy for some reason.

Otherwise, create a Feature and Update Site for your plugin as described here. An update site can either be a remote http server (SVN even), or a local directory. The nice thing is that you'll get versioning and the ability to upgrade and uninstall from inside Eclipse. It also makes things easier once your plugin grows into several plugins because they can be bundled together into a single, versioned feature.