java.lang.ClassNotFoundException while starting eclipse

Question

After purging and reinstalling eclipse with dpkg (Ubuntu) there is an error throws there:

cat     /home/sergiy/.eclipse/org.eclipse.platform_3.7.0_155965261/configuration/1337883707989.log
!SESSION Thu May 24 21:21:48 EEST 2012 -----------------------------------------
!ENTRY org.eclipse.equinox.launcher 4 0 2012-05-24 21:21:48.242
!MESSAGE Exception launching the Eclipse Platform:
!STACK
java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: org.eclipse.core.runtime.adaptor.EclipseStarter
    at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(URLClassLoader.java:217)
    at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
    at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(URLClassLoader.java:205)
    at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:321)
            at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(ClassLoader.java:266)
    at org.eclipse.equinox.launcher.Main.invokeFramework(Main.java:619)
    at org.eclipse.equinox.launcher.Main.basicRun(Main.java:577)
    at org.eclipse.equinox.launcher.Main.run(Main.java:1410)

Here is /usr/lib/eclipse/configuration/config.ini file:

#This configuration file was written by:     org.eclipse.equinox.internal.frameworkadmin.equinox.EquinoxFwConfigFileParser
#Wed Apr 04 13:29:31 UTC 2012
org.eclipse.update.reconcile=false
eclipse.p2.profile=PlatformProfile
osgi.instance.area.default=@user.home/workspace
osgi.framework=file\:plugins/org.eclipse.osgi_3.7.2.dist.jar
equinox.use.ds=true
eclipse.buildId=I20110613-1736
osgi.bundles=reference\:file\:org.eclipse.equinox.simpleconfigurator_1.0.200.dist.jar@1\:start
org.eclipse.equinox.simpleconfigurator.configUrl=file\:org.eclipse.equinox.simpleconfigurator/bundles.info
eclipse.product=org.eclipse.platform.ide
osgi.splashPath=platform\:/base/plugins/org.eclipse.platform
osgi.framework.extensions=
osgi.bundles.defaultStartLevel=4
eclipse.p2.data.area=@config.dir/../p2/
eclipse.application=org.eclipse.ui.ide.workbench
osgi.bundlefile.limit=100

How to fix this issue? Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

The first recommendation is to NOT install Eclipse from any Linux package manager or software repository. Instead, just get it from http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/. The builds that linux distro's install are often modified (mangled, some would say).

Answer 2

see https://askubuntu.com/a/695401/407641 for full instructions, ...

Highlights:

• Don't sudo apt-get eclipse, that version is old!
• Do download and install from http://www.eclipse.org/downloads
• Do create a ~/Desktop/eclipse.desktop file. Note, the full path to the Desktop folder will be dependent upon your version of ubuntu.