A Tour of the IDE

When you start the IDE for the first time, several things happen simultaneously:

The Main Window

The window at the top of the screen is referred to as the "main window." It is the command center for the IDE. In the main window, you can find the menu bar, several toolbars, and the workspace tabs (Editing, GUI Editing, Running, and Debugging). From the menus, you have access to all the top-level windows in the IDE, such as the Source Editor, the Properties window, the Debugger window, and the Options window.

The Help menu gives you access to such things as the online help and the Java Developer Connection site (under Bookmarks).The Java Developer Connection provides information on updates and pointers to Java resources. From the Help menu, choose Submit Feedback to send questions or comments about the IDE to the development team.

Menus and Toolbars

You can activate the most commonly called commands in the IDE from the main menu bar and the various toolbars in the main window. Each toolbar provides a group of related commands.

The following table lists the toolbars in the main window and describes the group of commands provided in each toolbar.

Toolbar Name Type of Commands
System Commands for opening a new template and saving open files
Edit Commands for editing source code
Data Commands that enable you to find or view information
Build Commands for compiling or building
Debug Commands for setting a breakpoint, adding a watch, getting trace information, and other common debugging commands

At the left side of each toolbar is a drag area. Use the drag area to reposition the toolbar.

Some toolbars exist outside of the main window. For example, the Component Palette is a toolbar in the Form Editor window. The Component Palette includes numerous tabs for various AWT, Swing, and JavaBeans components, along with a selection of layout managers and border.

Workspaces

A workspace is a set of windows that are related to performance of a particular task. From the main window, you can open the default workspaces: editing, GUI editing, running, and debugging. When the IDE is first started, the editing workspace is disiplayed. You can customize the workspaces to fit your needs.

To continue the tour of the IDE, see Workspaces for descriptions of the top-level windows in each workspace.

See also
Key Concepts

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