Eclipse: How to make Ctrl+F11 work no matter which file is being edited

configurationeclipseidekeyboard shortcuts

Ctrl + F11 is the "Run" keyboard shortcut in Eclipse.

But for me, that only works if a Main class is active in the editor. For any of the other 100+ java files in my workspace, eclipse pops up a dialog, complaining "Editor does not contain a main type".

This makes the Ctrl + F11 shortcut nearly useless. I either have to press Ctrl + Alt + T, name of main class, Ctrl + F11, or use the mouse.

Do I have something misconfigured? What can I do to make Ctrl + F11 really run my program, no matter which file is active in the editor? Or is everybody using the Ctrl + F11 shortcut like that?

edit: I'm using eclipse 3.5.0

Best Answer

You can configure Eclipse to always use the previously launched application: Window → Preferences → Run/Debug → Launching → Always launch the previously launched application. This almost always does what you want.

Related Solutions

Eclipse – How to get Eclipse to show .* files

In the package explorer, in the upper right corner of the view, there is a little down arrow. Tool tip will say view menu. From that menu, select filters

filters menu

From there, uncheck .* resources.

So Package Explorer -> View Menu -> Filters -> uncheck .* resources.

With Eclipse Kepler and OS X this is a bit different:

Package Explorer -> Customize View -> Filters -> uncheck .* resources

Eclipse – How to you speed up Eclipse

The three most influential factors for Eclipse speed are:

Using the latest version of Eclipse (2020-06 as on 26 June 2020)
Note that David Balažic's comment (July 2014) contradicts that criteria which was working six years ago:

The "same" workspace in Indigo (3.7.2) SR2 loads in 4 seconds, in Kepler SR2 (4.3.2) in 7 seconds and in Luna (4.4.0) in 10 seconds. All are Java EE bundles. Newer versions have more bundled plugins, but still the trend is obvious. (by "same" workspace I mean: same (additionally installed) plugins used, same projects checked out from version control).

Launching it with the latest JDK (Java 14 at the time of writing, which does not prevent you to compile in your Eclipse project with any other JDK you want: 1.4.2, 1.5, 1.6 older...)
```
  -vm jdk1.6.0_10\jre\bin\client\jvm.dll
```
Configuring the eclipse.ini (see this question for a complete eclipse.ini)
```
  -Xms512m
  -Xmx4096m
  [...]
```

The Xmx argument is the amount of memory Eclipse will get (in simple terms). With -Xmx4g, it gets 4 GB of RAM, etc.

Note:

Referring to the jvm.dll has advantages:

Splash screen coming up sooner.
Eclipse.exe in the process list instead of java.exe.
Firewalls: Eclipse wants access to the Internet instead of Java.
Window management branding issues, especially on Windows and Mac.

Dec. 2020, Udo conforms in the comments

From version 4.8 (Photon) an up there was a steady speed gain after each version.
The main platform was optimized every release to load faster, enable more features for the dark theme and to add more features for newer Java versions for the Java development tools.
Especially with-in the last 3 versions the startup time was increased a lot. There should be a significant increase in start-up time with the newest version of Eclipse 2020-12.

In my experience it started a lot faster with each new version.
But: There are still plug-ins which do not follow the new way of using the Eclipse API and are therefore still slow to start.
Since the change to Java 11 as the minimum runtime version starting from Eclipse version 2020-09 at least the core system uses the newer features of the JVM. It is up to the providers of the other plug-ins to upgrade to newer APIs and to use the full power of modern CPUs (e.g. concurrent programming model).

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Eclipse – How to get Eclipse to show .* files

Eclipse – How to you speed up Eclipse

Related Topic