Claude Code for Eclipse IDE

Unofficial community port — This is an independent Eclipse IDE adaptation of the Claude Code VS Code extension, built by eilonwy06. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or maintained by Anthropic.

An Eclipse IDE plugin that integrates Claude Code — Anthropic's AI-powered CLI — directly into your Eclipse development environment.

Installation

1. Open Eclipse and go to Help → Install New Software
2. Click Add and enter:
   • Name: Claude Code
   • URL: https://eilonwy06.github.io/claudecode-eclipse-ide/com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse.site/
3. Select the Claude Code for Eclipse IDE feature and follow the install prompts
4. Restart Eclipse when prompted

Prerequisites

• Eclipse IDE (tested with Eclipse 2023-12+)
• Java 21 or later
• Claude Code CLI installed and available on your PATH
• A valid Anthropic API key
• Windows: x86_64
• Linux: x86_64
• macOS: aarch64 (Apple Silicon) and x86_64 (Intel)

Required Eclipse Terminal bundles

The Claude CLI view embeds the Eclipse Terminal, so these bundles must be present (version 1.1.0 or newer, within the 1.x range):

• org.eclipse.terminal.control
• org.eclipse.terminal.connector.process
• org.eclipse.terminal.connector.local

…plus their transitive dependencies (notably CDT's native PTY support, org.eclipse.cdt.core.native), which p2 resolves automatically.

These bundles ship with most Eclipse packages (Eclipse IDE for C/C++ Developers, for Committers, for Enterprise Java Developers, and the full SDK), and the plugin's feature declares them, so p2 normally pulls them in during installation. If you're on the minimal Eclipse IDE for Java Developers and installation reports them as missing, install them first via Help → Install New Software from the main Eclipse release update site (search for Terminal). A reasonably recent Eclipse release is required, since Terminal 1.1+ ships only in newer versions.

Setting Up Claude Code CLI

1. Install Node.js (v18 or later) from nodejs.org if you don't have it
2. Install Claude Code CLI globally via npm:

   npm install -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code

3. Verify the install — open a terminal and run:

   claude --version

   You should see a version number. If the command is not found, ensure your npm global bin directory is on your PATH.

Setting Up Your Anthropic API Key

Claude Code CLI requires an Anthropic API key to function. You have two options:

Option A — Interactive login (recommended):

claude auth

Follow the prompts to log in. Your credentials are stored securely and reused automatically.

Option B — Environment variable:

Set ANTHROPIC_API_KEY in your environment before launching Eclipse:

• Windows: In System Properties → Environment Variables, add ANTHROPIC_API_KEY = sk-ant-...
• macOS/Linux: Add to your shell profile (~/.bashrc, ~/.zshrc, etc.):

  export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY="sk-ant-..."

You can get an API key from console.anthropic.com.

Usage

Opening the Views

Go to Window → Show View → Other → Claude Code and open the views you want:

• Claude Code — server status, launch/resume/restart controls
• Claude CLI — dedicated interactive terminal (multiple "Claude N" tabs), built on the Eclipse Terminal with full ANSI/24-bit color, scrollback, copy/paste, and customizable colors
• Claude Chat — web-based chat interface with markdown rendering

Getting Started

1. In the Claude Code view, click Launch Claude Terminal — this opens the Claude CLI view and starts Claude automatically
2. Type directly in the Claude CLI terminal, or switch to Claude Chat for a richer markdown interface
3. Claude can read your open files, selection, and workspace context automatically via MCP tools

Note (all platforms): The Claude CLI view embeds the Eclipse Terminal control and launches claude over a local PTY (ConPTY on Windows, native PTY on Linux/macOS), with full ANSI/24-bit color, scrollback, and resize. Copy/paste is available via the right-click menu or the keyboard: Ctrl/⌘+V (or Shift+Insert) to paste, Ctrl/⌘+Shift+C to copy, and Ctrl/⌘+C copies when text is selected (otherwise it passes through to interrupt Claude).

Font customization (all platforms): The console font can be changed in Window → Preferences → General → Appearance → Colors and Fonts → Basic → Claude CLI Console Font. By default it inherits from Eclipse's "Text Font" setting.

Color customization (all platforms): The Claude CLI's background/foreground colors — and the Dark/Light theme hint — can be set in Window → Preferences → Claude Code ("Claude CLI background", "Claude CLI foreground", and "Claude CLI theme"). These are independent of Eclipse's built-in Terminal colors and apply immediately without restart.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
Ctrl+Shift+C	Toggle Claude Code view
Ctrl+Shift+S	Send current editor selection to Claude
Ctrl+Alt+A	Add current file to Claude's context

These are also available from the Claude Code menu in the menu bar and from the right-click context menu in any text editor.

Chat Controls

• Clear — clears the chat display
• New Session — starts a fresh conversation
• Resume Session (Claude Code view) — resumes the previous CLI session with --resume
• Restart Server (Claude Code view) — restarts the internal MCP server

What Claude Can Do in Eclipse

Claude has access to the following MCP tools, which it invokes automatically:

Tool	Description
openFile	Open a file at a specific line/column with optional text selection
getOpenEditors	List all open editor tabs
getCurrentSelection	Get the currently selected text and its location
getLatestSelection	Get the most recent selection (even after focus change)
getWorkspaceFolders	List all open Eclipse projects
getDiagnostics	Get errors and warnings from Eclipse's problem markers
saveDocument	Save a file
checkDocumentDirty	Check if a file has unsaved changes
openDiff	Show a diff view comparing proposed vs. current file content
closeAllDiffTabs	Close all open diff tabs

Configuration

Go to Window → Preferences → Claude Code to configure:

Setting	Default	Description
Start server automatically	On	Auto-start the MCP server when Eclipse launches
Track editor selection	On	Continuously track cursor/selection for Claude context
Claude command	claude	Path to the Claude CLI executable
Arguments	(empty)	Additional CLI arguments (e.g., --model claude-opus-4-7-20260418)
Port range (min/max)	10000–65535	Port range for the internal HTTP+SSE server
Claude CLI theme	Dark	Theme hint for Claude's /theme auto (Dark or Light); applies immediately
Claude CLI background / foreground	#121314 / #E5E5E5	Terminal colors, independent of Eclipse's Terminal; apply immediately

Architecture

The plugin follows a Rust-first approach: the heavy logic — HTTP/SSE server, MCP/JSON-RPC protocol, chat process management, and lock-file handling — lives in a native Rust library (claude-eclipse-core) loaded via JNI. Java is a thin glue layer for Eclipse/SWT API calls.

Claude CLI  <--NDJSON-->  Rust (chat.rs)  --JNI callbacks-->  Java (ClaudeChatView)
                          Rust (mcp.rs)   --JNI tool call-->  Java (McpToolRegistry)
                          Rust (server.rs) --SSE-->           Claude CLI

Project Structure

Project	Description
claude-eclipse-core	Rust native library — HTTP+SSE server, MCP/JSON-RPC protocol, chat process manager, lock-file management. Built as a cdylib (claude_eclipse_core.dll / libclaude_eclipse_core.so / libclaude_eclipse_core.dylib)
com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse	Eclipse plugin — UI views, MCP tool implementations, JNI bridge, chat HTML/JS
com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse.feature	Eclipse feature definition — declares the plugin and its metadata
com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse.site	p2 update site — the installable artifacts hosted via GitHub Pages

Building the Native Library

The Rust library must be compiled for each target platform:

Windows (native build):

cd claude-eclipse-core
cargo build --release
cp target/release/claude_eclipse_core.dll ../com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse/native/windows/x86_64/

Linux (via Docker):

From Linux/macOS:

cd claude-eclipse-core
docker run --rm -v "$(pwd):/src" -w /src rust:slim-bullseye cargo build --release
cp target/release/libclaude_eclipse_core.so \
   ../com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse/native/linux/x86_64/

From Windows (CMD):

docker run --rm -v "%cd%:/src" -w /src rust:slim-bullseye cargo build --release
copy claude-eclipse-core\target\release\libclaude_eclipse_core.so ^
     com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse\native\linux\x86_64\

From Windows (PowerShell):

docker run --rm -v "${PWD}:/src" -w /src rust:slim-bullseye cargo build --release
copy claude-eclipse-core\target\release\libclaude_eclipse_core.so `
     com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse\native\linux\x86_64\

macOS (native build — must be built on a Mac):

rustup target add aarch64-apple-darwin x86_64-apple-darwin
cd claude-eclipse-core
cargo build --release --target aarch64-apple-darwin
cargo build --release --target x86_64-apple-darwin
cp target/aarch64-apple-darwin/release/libclaude_eclipse_core.dylib \
   ../com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse/native/macos/aarch64/
cp target/x86_64-apple-darwin/release/libclaude_eclipse_core.dylib \
   ../com.anthropic.claudecode.eclipse/native/macos/x86_64/

Cross-compiling to macOS from Windows/Linux requires Apple's SDK and is not supported — build on a Mac.

Updating the Plugin

After making changes and rebuilding the update site in Eclipse:

git add .
git commit -m "vX.X.X - description of changes"
git push

GitHub Pages will redeploy within ~1 minute and the new version will be available to install.

Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md for the full release history.

Contributing

Pull requests are welcome. For major changes, please open an issue first to discuss what you would like to change.

Credits

Special thanks to xgsa for helping fix some issues in Linux and for improving the plugin.

License

MIT