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Installing Eclipse

Installing Eclipse and oXygen

Why Eclipse?

In this manual we will explain how developers can work with Eclipse and either oXygen or XMLSpy Editor used as Eclipse plugin. Eclipse is used for CVS operations and file management. Eclipse is available for Mac, Windows or Unix and therefore a good solution for a group of authors working together. You are free to use other CVS and project management software.

Since Eclipse is an open source project, you can get it for free from the eclipse.org website. oXygen, the XML editor of choice (for us), is a commercial software and is based on Java (like Eclipse) and therefore also available for Mac OSX, Windows, Linux and different Unix flavors. Additionally, it is also available as an integrated Eclipse plugin, which makes it easier for authors using eLML to have all their working files in one place and working with one single tool. The platform-independency of Eclipse and oXygen makes it for us the no. 1 choice when working with XML and CVS. But also Altovas XMLSpy is available as Eclipse plugin but only on Windows platforms. So here is a short tutorial on how to install the software on your computer:

  1. Download Eclipse and install it on your harddisk. Choose the classic Eclipse release since it contains all the tools we need.
  2. Start Eclipse. You will be asked to define a workspace where all your files will be stored. We recommend creating a new folder and naming it e.g. "eclipse_elml_workspace". Now lets install the oXygen plugin.
  3. Open the Menu "Help" and go to "Install New Software". In the field "Work with:" enter the following URL http://www.oxygenxml.com/InstData/Eclipse/site.xml and hit the enter key. (If the above URL does not work, check the oXygen Download page for more info)
  4. Eclipse will look for the available software now. In the result window select the check box for the oXygen XML Editor and press the "Next" button two times.
  5. After accepting the license and clicking the "finish" button oXygen starts downloading and installing. When finished, you must do a restart of Eclipse. Now you can open an XML file and oXygen will be loaded into Eclipse. Please note that this is a commercial software so you will have to enter a (trial) license key when oXygen opens the first time.
  6. If you would also like to install the XMLSpy plugin, please go to Altovas Eclipse page and download the Installer. Follow the instructions of the installer.