Jump into interface implementation in Eclipse IDE

Question

You know how in Eclipse, pressing F3 over a method will take you to its declaration? Well I have a method that is part of an interface; clicking F3 over this naturally takes me to the declaring interface.

Obviously there is an object implementing this interface and this is where the method is actually implemented. I want, when I press F3, to jump to the implementation, not the interface declaration. I know that the implementation may not be known at compile-time, so is there a way for Eclipse to show me all the classes implementing the interface so that I can select which implemented method to view? Right now when this happens I am just manually searching for this to find the implemented method.

Everything is slightly inconvenient to do in Java. Try .NET 6 on Visual Studio, it's a million times better experience. :) — Ash K, Jul 20 '22 at 13:51

score 140 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 04 '14 at 06:33

Here's what I do:

In the interface, move the cursor to the method name. Press F4. => Type Hierarchy view appears
In the lower part of the view, the method should already be selected. In its toolbar, click "Lock view and show members in hierarchy" (should be the leftmost toolbar icon).
In the upper part of the view, you can browse through all implementations of the method.

The procedure isn't very quick, but it gives you a good overview.

score 133 · Answer 2 · edited Jul 20 '17 at 07:33

133

Well... well... I hope you use Eclipse Helios, because what you asked is available on Helios.

Put your text cursor again on the method and click menu Navigate → Open Implementation. Now if you have more than one implementation of the method, you will get choice to pick which implementation to open.

alt text

By defining a keybinding on Preferences → General → Keys you can even use the feature easier, but before you do that, see if this shortcut is fast enough for you.

Press Ctrl + click and hold. Now move your mouse over the same method. Tadam… you will get choice.

alt text

If you pick Open Implementation you’ll get the same choice as before.

edited Jul 20 '17 at 07:33

exic

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answered Jul 15 '10 at 13:41

nanda

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Fantastic. This solves something that has always bugged me about eclipse. :) Thanks a lot. – brimborium May 29 '13 at 07:10
Great tip! but also you may just hover cursor over and press ctrl then select from dropdown [in eclipse oxygen].... I mean you may not need to hold ctrl + click now. – old-monk Apr 11 '18 at 20:58

score 78 · Answer 3 · edited Mar 04 '14 at 06:37

78

Press Ctrl + T on the method name (rather than F3). This gives the type hierarchy as a pop-up so is slightly faster than using F4 and the type hierarchy view.

Also, when done on a method, subtypes that don't implement/override the method will be greyed out, and when you double click on a class in the list it will take you straight to the method in that class.

edited Mar 04 '14 at 06:37

Chandrayya G K

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answered Jul 15 '10 at 13:27

Jonathan

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Works also great with keyboard-only. Just CTRL+T and use arrow keys to navigate. Press Enter to jump to the implementation. – It's Leto Mar 12 '15 at 11:28

score 55 · Answer 4 · edited Mar 04 '14 at 06:35

55

There's a big productivity boost if you add an Alt + F3 key binding to the Open Implementation feature, and just use F3 to go to interfaces, and Alt + F3 to go to implementations.

Open implementation keybinding

edited Mar 04 '14 at 06:35

Chandrayya G K

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answered Jul 18 '11 at 09:17

Lukasz Frankowski

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Great tip ! Thanks. Just sad that eclipse searches only one level of hierarchy though. – Snicolas Jan 27 '12 at 16:39
This solution worked for me. Many of the others (especially the pluggins) did not. – Nelda.techspiress Jun 17 '16 at 20:38
In Eclipse Neon Alt+F3 is used for `Incremental Find`, I chose Alt+I instead – Ori Marko Aug 30 '18 at 06:58

score 15 · Answer 5 · edited Mar 04 '14 at 06:36

15

Highlight an interface and use Ctrl+T to open "Quick Type Hierarchy".

edited Mar 04 '14 at 06:36

Chandrayya G K

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answered Jan 09 '13 at 02:15

Roland

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score 14 · Answer 6 · answered Jun 29 '16 at 15:29

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ctrl + mouse hover + click "Open Implementation"

On ctrl + hover, you should see the following menu:

Tested on Eclipse Mars.2 (4.5.2)

answered Jun 29 '16 at 15:29

tbraun

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score 3 · Answer 7 · answered Jan 08 '15 at 18:34

Here is what I do:

I press command (on Mac, probably control on PC) and then hover over the method or class. When you do this a popup window will appear with the choices "Open Declaration", "Open Implementation", "Open Return Type". You can then click on what you want and Eclipse brings you right there. I believe this works for version 3.6 and up.

It is just as quick as IntelliJ I think.

score 2 · Answer 8 · edited Aug 05 '15 at 23:36

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I always use this implementors plugin to find all the implementation of an Interface

http://eclipse-tools.sourceforge.net/updates/

it's my favorite and the best

edited Aug 05 '15 at 23:36

k-den

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answered Jul 23 '13 at 20:52

supernova

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score 2 · Answer 9 · edited May 23 '17 at 10:31

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See In eclipse, ctrl-click goes to the declaration of the method I clicked. For interfaces with one implementation, how can I just directly to that implementation? for some alternative solutions.

Anyway, I think you might be looking for something like this:

http://eclipse-tools.sourceforge.net/implementors/

edited May 23 '17 at 10:31

Community

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answered Jul 15 '10 at 12:56

mahju

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Thanks this was helpful too. From that link you can also click on the method while hold down 'cntrl' and then choose 'Open Implementation'. This is even faster. – aeq Jul 15 '10 at 13:07

score 0 · Answer 10 · answered Jul 13 '15 at 14:40

0

The best solution would be Ctrl+Alt+I.

answered Jul 13 '15 at 14:40

computingfreak

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score 0 · Answer 11 · answered Jul 15 '10 at 15:46

If you are really looking to speed your code navigation, you might want to take a look at nWire for Java. It is a code exploration plugin for Eclipse. You can instantly see all the related artifacts. So, in that case, you will focus on the method call and instantly see all possible implementations, declarations, invocations, etc.

Jump into interface implementation in Eclipse IDE

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