[news.eclipse.newcomer] Re: Loading jars dynamic from plugins

["Walter Harley" <eclipse@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

"Franz Philipp Moser" <pm@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message 
news:dcb02f1d56d6d9f961e57d6dc824e96b$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> can I load eclipse with adding some jars to the classpath? This would help 
> a lot!

Do you mean, can you add jars to the classpath that you use to launch 
Eclipse with, and then expect the classes in those jars to be visible to 
plug-ins?  In general, no, I don't think so; and you shouldn't, anyway.

Eclipse is a modular application platform.  (It's also an IDE built on top 
of that modular application platform.)  The thing that makes it modular is 
that there are strict boundaries placed on how classes in different modules 
can interact with each other.  Those boundaries are defined by the OSGi 
spec, which Eclipse implements.  So the whole point here is that Eclipse is 
what it is, and is able to do what it does, precisely *because* of these 
limitations.  Making classes visible to all plug-ins is sort of like putting 
all of your classes in the same package and declaring all your methods and 
fields to be public: sure, it makes coding easier in the short term, but it 
makes the code unmanageable as the application grows.

What exactly is it that you are trying to do?  Is there some reason that 
createExecutableExtension() is not a good answer for you?