Eclipse IDE Pocket Guide

Maximizing and Minimizing

Sometimes you need to focus temporarily on a single view or editor. For example, you might want to hide all the views and use the whole Eclipse window to look at one large file in the editor. You could resize the editor manually by dragging its edges, but an easier way is to maximize the editor.

Double-click on the view or editor's titlebar (or click on the maximize icon) to make it expand; double-click again (or use the restore icon) to restore the window to its original size. When a window is maximized, you won't be able to see any of the other views or editors outside of the current stack.

As an alternative, you can temporarily shrink the other stacks of windows by clicking on the minimize icon (next to the maximize icon at the top of the view or editor). This hides the content area, showing only the titlebar. It works best on horizontal views and editors.

Tip

Remember, you can save your favorite window arrangements as named perspectives.

You could spend hours exploring all the options to customize your Eclipse workbench, but that's not what you're here for, right? Part III will get you started with Java development in Eclipse.