[jdt-ui-dev] newbie questions to eclipse/JDT gui

[Martin Hajduch <martin.hajduch@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

hi !

i'm not sure if this is the right mailinglist but i haven't found a
better one

i'm using jbuilder foundation for a while, and i have just tried eclipse
there is definitely some functionality in eclipse which i like very
much, and which is not in jbuilder foundation (some of it is in jbuilder
enterprise but that one is quite pricey)

however, after some days of using it, i have discovered following issues
which i don't know how to change (in configuration, if possible) and are
quite disturbing:

NOTE: i'm using resolution 1200x900, linux, gnome, recent version of all
software, i was trying eclipse 2.0.x

- project explorer - line spacing is way too big; icons are too big .. i
mean - the same thing in jbuilder needs much less space on the screen to
give me the same overview
i can make the font smaller, but the distance between the lines is still
quite big

- starting/stopping applications
as far as i have understood, either i use 'debug/run last application'
or i have to go through 'Run' menu; is there another way how to quickly
start/stop different applications in workspace ?
also - the window showing which applications are running, is there a way
how to configure it so that when i start the same application the second
time, it 'reuses' the previous record in this window ?

- GUI in general - decoractions are too big
i think that there is too much wasted space on the screen, leaving less
space for important stuff like source code, class hierarchy, etc ...
the 'bars' between the windows are too wide, etc ...

my overall feeling was, that jbuilder gives me more information on the
same screen with the same resultions
i can't really exactly tell why it is so, apart from the above issues ..

is there a way how can i configure these things ? especially project
explorer and decorations ?
i have tried various window manager and themes, playing with system
fonts and screen resolution setting in gnome, etc ...
but i guess that eclipse is using it's own widget toolkit, isn't it ?

i see a lot of potential here, and i would gladly try it again if there
is a way how to influence all these things

thank you very much for any hint,

regards,
martin