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So since Eclipse juno is based on 4.2 instead of 3.7, what is the easiest way to upgrade to it, short of installing a separate copy of juno and re-installing all my existing plugins from 3.7 into it?

There doesnt seem to be a straightforward upgrade path mentioned on eclipse.org.

Kara
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pdeva
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    I'm actually glad that I used a new "installation" (or whatever you call unzipping an archive). I got rid of a lot of plugins I once tried and never used again and now just have the ones left I really need. – moeTi Jun 29 '12 at 14:21
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    @moeTi good point, but eclipse should still be able to update autonomously – NimChimpsky Jun 29 '12 at 14:22
  • @NimChimpsky That would be nice, i have to always download my plugins or put on the plugin folder everytime i upgrade... – alculete Oct 15 '12 at 15:47
  • @Danilo I recently *upgraded* to intellij, should have done it yrs ago. – NimChimpsky Oct 15 '12 at 15:57
  • @NimChimpsky I always used eclipse (netbeans maybe for couple months). i never thought about 'jumping' to a different IDE, but if they don't do an easy upgrade to a new version and i always have to do the upgrade by downloading a new version and delete the old, I will think about the "big jump" – alculete Oct 17 '12 at 05:58
  • @Danilo I used eclipse for 10 years up until about a monht ago, upgraded to 4.2 and after about a week it just stopped opening. There are a number of cases if you google it and on here. So I was kind of forced to change, good thing to. – NimChimpsky Oct 17 '12 at 06:14
  • sou @NimChimpsky in your opinion comparing the pros and cons of both IDEs witch one is better? Because if we compare this update issue with the whole software maybe Eclipse still the best – alculete Oct 17 '12 at 06:20
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    @Danilo huh ? No way, intellij is much better in every way. But it costs, I think its worth it though. – NimChimpsky Oct 17 '12 at 06:24
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    Modern Eclipse (like version 4.5) has installer, which will install a suitable edition for you, and workspace will be automatically upgraded on first launch, seamlessly from version 3.7. – Raptor Mar 04 '16 at 07:07

4 Answers4

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Eclipse can barely update from 3.7.1 to 3.7.2, never mind from 3.7 to 4.2.

You're taking the life of your development environment in your hands if you try to make that much of an upgrade to an existing Eclipse development environment. I don't know about you, but my development environment is too important to risk upgrading.

Always create a new Eclipse directory and new Eclipse workspaces when you want to change your development environment.

Unzip Eclipse 4.2 to a new directory, and add your plug-ins one at a time. You can use Bananeweizen's method to copy the Eclipse 3.7 plug-ins, or you can add them manually. It's probably a good idea to see if the plug-ins you use have been upgraded for Eclipse 4.2.

Create a new Eclipse 4.2 workspace, and copy your project code from your Eclipse 3.7 workspace. If you discover a problem later, you can fall back to Eclipse 3.7 and your Eclipse 3.7 workspaces.

When you have an Eclipse 4.2 environment that works, zip it back up and keep the zip file so you can restore your Eclipse 4.2 environment in the event your Eclipse gets corrupted.

Never ever think of changing your working environment.

Gilbert Le Blanc
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Download the platform runtime binary from http://download.eclipse.org/eclipse/downloads/drops4/R-4.2-201206081400/. That is basically an "Eclipse without plugins". Run it (on a fresh workspace), select File -> Import -> Installation -> From existing Installation and point the wizard to your existing 3.7 directory. Check "Install latest versions", hit finish.

That will install the latest versions of the plugins found in your 3.7 installation into your 4.2 installation. Sadly most people don't know this feature and install each plugin manually when upgrading.

Bonus anwser: With the same wizard you can also export the list of installed features into a file that you can share with colleagues, so you have all installed the same plugins.

Bananeweizen
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  • I really have never heard of this feature. Is this documented anywhere? – pdeva Jun 29 '12 at 15:57
  • In the 3.7 "What's new" document, section Install/Update: http://help.eclipse.org/indigo/index.jsp?topic=%2Forg.eclipse.platform.doc.user%2FwhatsNew%2Fplatform_whatsnew.html – Bananeweizen Jun 29 '12 at 15:59
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    There doesnt seem to be any 'Install latest versions' checkbox and so i get an old version dependency error when trying to install http://screencast.com/t/5FDB2tR6LNSk . How do i get it to install the latest version? – pdeva Jun 29 '12 at 22:23
  • here is the dependency error msg i get when clicking 'next' http://screencast.com/t/ZQtawJnfpU9v – pdeva Jun 29 '12 at 22:24
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    ok, turns out, you have to export software configuration from previous version, then import it into the new version, otherwise juno will just try to copy/past the plugins into its own repo since it doesnt know about the update sites. However, even on doing this there are cryptic dependency issue messages which i dont know how to resolve. I will have to mark Gilbert's answer as the correct one. There really is no good way to update eclipse. – pdeva Jun 29 '12 at 23:48
  • Oh, sorry, you are right. The "latest versions" checkbox is indeed only available when using the file based import (and so you have to export before, as you said). The error message is resolved by deselecting the "Eclipse IDE for JavaEE developers". – Bananeweizen Jun 30 '12 at 06:54
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    Seems like a great idea, but unfortunately the import wizard gives a "Specify the path to a valid application installation." error when I select my existing installation. :( – thSoft Jul 16 '12 at 09:46
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    For anyone wondering, the default path to your existing Eclipse directory is ~/.eclipse/org.eclipse.platform*/ – varagrawal Oct 16 '12 at 01:26
  • I had Helios Eclipse installed in `C:\Eclipse`, and pointed to that one in order to import. After a couple of *trial and error* attempts, I successfully imported most of my plugins. I had to manually exclude Eclipse IDE for Java Developers, EMF and Aptana studio. It turns out the first two were somehow already included, and the third could be manually installed. – superjos Nov 27 '12 at 17:40
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    Just did this to update from Indigo to Kepler. I did not have superjos's issue--Eclipse was smart enough to disable the Eclipse IDE for Java Developers from being carried over. Very helpful solution! – ameed Jul 03 '13 at 19:32
  • It worked. I did the plugin update from Juno to Luna. Thanks. – Uresh K Apr 15 '15 at 14:52
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i just added http://download.eclipse.org/releases/juno/ to Window -> Pref -> Install/Update -> Available Software Sites

after that you can update your software at Help -> check for updates

seems to work fine for me

Anonymous
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    This worked for me.. At first it threw a few errors and installation failed coz I had java 7 installed. Then I switched to java 6 update 27. Then tried again. It worked. – Ron Mar 16 '13 at 06:48
  • When I tried this method I had to add an intermediate release and update to that one first to resolve dependency problems. – davenpcj Nov 07 '14 at 20:02
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Took me 2 minutes to migrate (longest part is the download ;)):

  • Download the last release of eclipse : http://download.eclipse.org/eclipse/downloads/

  • Extract the archive, launch the new version and select your existing workspace

  • From the menu File -> Import

    • Select Install/From existing installation

    • It will let you choose which extension you want to keep (still compatible)

Note: I tested this manipulation from an Eclipse 4.2 to 4.3. I'm adding this answer because I think this solution is fast, easy and safe compared to the other answer.

Nicolas Lauquin
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  • Unfortunately this doesn't work for upgrading from 3.7 to 4.4 - it gives an error about the workspace being invalid (even though it says it will upgrade your workspace). – CpnCrunch Aug 27 '14 at 17:33
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    This partially worked for me, going 3.8 to 4.5. It did a good job at migrating my settings/preferences, however I had to manually reinstall several plugins after the migrated versions 1) no longer worked, and 2) could not be updated within Eclipse. – aroth Jul 01 '16 at 08:27