README_Eclipse_Linux.md

Installation of Eclipse (Kepler) on Linux (Centos6.4/RHEL), with plugins for SCons, Git, GitHub, and Python

Install Eclipse

There exists an Eclipse plugin for SCons, called SConsolidator. As of January, 2014, this plugin works only with the Kepler version of Eclipse.

Most of this information can be found at:

Installing Eclipse on Fedora/Centos6.4/RHEL.

To download and install this version of Eclipse, go to:

Eclipse Kepler SR1 Downloads

and download the Linux 64-bit version. The file should be called:

eclipse-cpp-kepler-SR1-linux-gtk-x86_64.tar.gz

Before you install this version of eclipse, you may have to uninstall the (older) version that ships with Centos6.4/RHEL (The rpms may have been installed depending on what choices you made during the system installation process). If 'which eclipse' tells you that it has been installed, then uninstall the older version with the following series of commands:

$ yum erase eclipse
$ yum erase eclipse-cdt
$ yum erase eclipse-rcp
$ yum erase eclipse-swt
$ yum erase jetty-eclipse
$ yum erase icu4j-eclipse

This worked for me. You can check to see if all eclipse-related rpms have been uninstalled with

$ rpm -qa | grep -i eclipse

If there are other rpms reported, you can uninstall them with commands similar to those above.

We are going to install eclipse under /opt (of course, you can install it anywhere you like - modify the commands below as necessary). The procedure below will require superuser privileges.

$ cd
$ sudo tar -xvzf ~/Downloads/eclipse-cpp-kepler-SR1-linux-gtk-x86_64.tar.gz -C /opt
$ chmod -R +r /opt/eclipse

Now, we want to add a script to /usr/bin to launch eclipse.

$ sudo touch /usr/bin/eclipse
$ sudo chmod 755 /usr/bin/eclipse

With your favorite editor, create the /usr/bin/eclipse file with the following content:

#!/bin/sh
export ECLIPSE_HOME="/opt/eclipse"

$ECLIPSE_HOME/eclipse $*

You may also want to create the Gnome desktop launcher for eclipse. Create the file

/usr/share/applications/eclipse.desktop

with the following content:

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Name=Eclipse
Comment=Eclipse SDK 4.3.1
Exec=eclipse
Icon=/opt/eclipse/icon.xpm
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Categories=GNOME;Application;Development;
StartupNotify=true

Start up Eclipse from the command line with:

$ eclipse

When you start up Eclipse, you will get a window asking you to choose a workspace. The default is usually /Users/****/Documents/workspace. This is fine, but you might want to choose someplace else. Make sure to click the "Use this as the default ..." radio button so that you will not get asked this every time.

When Eclipse finally starts up, you can click on the "X" on the welcome page, and it should take you to the Project Explorer page. This is the main view that you will probably end up using most of the time.

Install the SConsolidator Plugin

In order for Eclipse to work with SCons, one has to install a plugin called SConsolidator. To do this, do the following:

a) Go to Help->Install New Software

b) In the Install window that comes up, in the "Work with" field, enter:

http://www.sconsolidator.com/update

and click on "Add..."

c) Specify the name as "SConsolidator"

d) Check the Eclipse Plug-In for SCons radio button, then hit Next> and follow the installation through.

e) After the installation, Eclipse will need to be restarted, which it should do automatically.

When Eclipse restarts, it will ask you about setting the path to SCons. Set this up now. Check to see where SCons is installed by doing "which scons" from a terminal window. For me, it is in /usr/local/bin/scons, and so I entered that for the path to the SCons executable.

To change the SCons build options (at any time), you can go to Eclipse->Preferences, and then expand the SCons tag, to reveal options for Build Settings, Performance vs. Accuracy, and Warnings. In particular, if you want to build the standalone executables, you can add 'standalone=1' to the SCons Options in Build Settings.

Install PyDev for Python Support

PyDev includes a nice Python editor with appropriate syntax highlighting, as well as providing the "mouse-over" documentation features of Eclipse for those things that are written in Python - namely SCons.

As of this writing, Eclipse Kepler does not play so nicely with PyDev-3.X, and so we will install PyDev-2.X instead. The reason may be related to issues with Java 1.6 vs. 1.7, in fact.

a) Go to Help->Install New Software

b) In the Install window that comes up, in the "Work with" field, enter:

http://pydev.org/updates

and click on "Add..."

c) Specify the name as "PyDev" and hit return

d) IMPORTANT: Uncheck the radio button to show versions other than the latest version in the bottom portion of this window.

e) Look for the PyDev for Eclipse Version 2.8.2, and check this radio button.

d) Proceed with the installation.

e) IMPORTANT: At some point it may ask you to allow a certain security certificate - you actually have to check the radio button in the top part of the window and THEN accept the certificate.

f) After the installation, Eclipse will need to be restarted, which it should do automatically.

Restart Eclipse; you should now have access to PyDev. You should see it by going to Eclipse->About Eclipse->Installation Details->Installed Software

Setting up Git within Eclipse

Much of this comes from this article.

a) Basic Configuration

Select Window → Preferences → Team → Git

Under the field for Cloning Repositories, choose a location (locally) for storing respositories that you will eventually clone to create.

Select Window → Preferences → Team → Git → Configuration

Choose the User Settings Tab: