How can I run an Eclipse plug-in written by me that automates Eclipse through its GUI using SWTBot

Question

I wrote an Eclipse plug-in using SWTBot to automate Eclipse through its GUI. Actually I'm running this plug-in from Eclipse with Eclipse Application run configuration to test it. That opens a new Eclipse instance. After that I can start the plug-in with a toolbarbutton using ui.actionSets extension.

I'd like to start an Eclipse from command prompt and would like this plug-in to start automatically. In my case Eclipse shall be started with GUI of course.

Do you know any working solution for this problem?

Answer 1

You can use the org.eclipse.ui.startup extension point. You need to provide a IStartup implementing class that is called when the workbench is started.

Note: this is not a complete fail safe method, as the user is able to disable this extension point in the Workbench > Startup preference page.