Vaadin Plug-in for Eclipse

The easiest way to get started with Vaadin development is to install the Vaadin Plug-in for Eclipse. You don't need to download or install anything else but the plug-in to your Eclipse IDE for Java EE Developers (Ganymede or newer) to start development. Learn more about the features.

Download and install

To install the plugin:

  • Select Install New Software... from the Help -menu
  • Add new update site:
    • Eclipse 3.5 and newer: http://vaadin.com/eclipse
    • Eclipse 3.4: http://vaadin.com/eclipse/3.4
      Visual Designer not available in the Eclipse 3.4 version.
  • Select the features you want to install and click Next to proceed with the installation.

Alternatively you can install the Vaadin Plug-in for Eclipse from the Eclipse Marketplace or you can download an offline installation package for Vaadin 6 from the Directory.

If you are looking for the latest nightly build version of the plug-in, you can use http://vaadin.com/eclipse/experimental update site.

 

Plug-in Features

  • Create compositions with the visual designer

    You can create a CustomComponent based compositions and edit them with the visual designer tool included with the plug-in.

    • Select File -> New -> Other...
    • Select Vaadin Composite from the dialog
    • Click on the Design tab below the code editor to switch to the visual designer

  • Create new Vaadin project

    The plug-in provides a wizard for creating new Vaadin application projects that can be deployed as Servlets, Portlets or on Google App Engine.

    • Select File -> New -> Project...
    • Select Vaadin Project
    • Set the name of the application
    • You can choose to create a project stub if you want to
    • If you are creating a portlet, you can choose to create portlet configuration automatically

    To run your application:

    • Select Run -> Run As -> Run on server
    • Select server to run your application on
    • You can now open your application in a web browser on http://localhost:8080/<MyApp>/.

  • Create new widgets with ease

    The plug-in provides templates for easily creating new components that have a GWT based client-side widget that communicates with the server-side component.

    • Select File -> New -> Other...
    • Select Vaadin Widget from the dialog
    • The plug-in creates a template classes for you to start building your own widgets

  • Create new themes

    The plug-in creates all the needed files for a new look and feel (theme) so that you can just start applying your own CSS definitions.

    • Select File -> New -> Other...
    • Select Vaadin Theme from the dialog

  • Debug your client-side widgets

    You can also easily use the GWT development mode to debug and speed up your client-side development.

    • Select File -> Properties -> Vaadin
    • Click on the Create development mode launch button to create a launch configuration (see the screenshot)
    • Make sure your server is running on debug mode and launch the configuration by selecting Debug as... -> GWT development mode for <your project>
    • If you haven't yet installed the GWT Developer Plugin just follow the on-screen instructions on your browser
    • Now you can make changes to your client-side GWT code without recompilation and use breakpoints to debug your GWT code