How do I link to an external file from Eclipse?
Author: Deron Eriksson
Description: This tutorial describes how to link to an external file through your Navigator View in Eclipse.
Tutorial created using: Windows XP || JDK 1.5.0_09 || Eclipse Web Tools Platform 1.5.1


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Sometimes I find myself going to the same files over and over in the file system while doing JavaSW web development. For instance, with TomcatSW, I access server.xml all the time. With OC4J on certain projects, I find myself accessing server.xml, http-web-site.xml, and data-sources.xml.

First off, let's create a basic project to store our shortcuts to files such as these.

New Project

In the New Project window, we can select General → Project and click Next.

General Project

We can then give the project a name. I recommend starting the project name with an underscore so that it will appear at the top of all your projects. Here, I name the project '_shortcuts'. Click Finish to finish creating the new project.

Naming project '_shortcuts'

We can now see our new project in the Navigator view, and it appears at the top of all the projects since it begins with an underscore.

'_shortcuts' project in Navigator View

Now, let's create a link to an external file. In this example, we'll link to tomcat's server.xml file. You can right-click _shortcuts, go to New, and go to File.

New File

Click on the Advanced button on the New File window.

Click Advanced

Check the 'Link to file in the file system' checkbox and then click Browse... to browse to the file.

Click 'Link to file in the file system' and click 'Browse'

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