StartupProblems

When I try to start Eclipse I get a message that points me to the log, where I find an error like this:

!ENTRY org.eclipse.osgi juin 26, 2005 00:38:52.769

!MESSAGE Error registering XML parser services.

!STACK 0

java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: javax.xml.parsers.SAXParserFactory

What is the problem?

The cause of this problem is that your system is running Eclipse with an older version of the JVM. Eclipse 3.x and above require at least a 1.4.2 JVM or higher in order to run (as is stated clearly on the downloads page where you got Eclipse). If you look up a few lines in your log file, you will also find a line that indicates which JVM version Eclipse has found and is using - it will not be 1.4.

But I have a 1.4 or higher JVM installed - why isn't Eclipse using that one?

JVMs on Windows paltform are sometimes tricky. First of all, there is the MS JVM installed in the Windows system directories that is always on the system path. That can cause problems if it is on the path before other JVM binaries that you want to use. Furthermore, some ill-behaved programs (most notably, Oracle client software) install their own JVM at the front of your system path without telling you, which can mess with Eclipse since it will find that JVM before any others (Oracle should be flogged for making their installer do this, but it has not been fixed as of Oracle 9i!)
In order to avoid these types of problems, it is best to explicitly tell Eclipse which JVM (preferably a JDK) that you want it to run under. You do this by specifying the -vm command line argument to eclipse.exe
Here is an example of a command-line to start Eclipse with a specific JVM:

eclipse.exe -vm c:\Java\JDK\1.4.2\bin\javaw.exe

Note that the value of the -vm argument is the full path to a JVM executable. There are other arguments that control the JVM Eclipse uses, most notably -vmargs. See RunningThePlatform for more details.

Why does eclipse complain that it can't find a java VM?

If you get an error message on startup saying that it was unable to find a java VM, you should try starting with the "-vm" command line argument to specify exactly which VM to use. For example:

eclipse.exe -vm c:\Java\JDK\1.4.2\bin\javaw.exe

How come Eclipse won't start with a java 1.1, 1.2, or 1.3 VM?

Eclipse 3.x and above requires java version 1.4.2 or greater to run (among other reasons, 1.4.2 includes the SAX XML parser that is needed by Eclipse).
Note that it is still possible to write and run programs from within Eclipse using an older JVM/JDK, but Eclipse itself requires 1.4.2 or greater.

Eclipse fails to start with ClassCastException

If you tried to start Eclipse and you got something like this in the log:

java.lang.ExceptionInInitializerError: java.lang.ClassCastException:

org.apache.xerces.parsers.StandardParserConfiguration

        at org.apache.xerces.parsers.SAXParser.(SAXParser.java:95)

This means you have a version of xerces installed on your machine that is interfering with the version of xerces that is included with Eclipse. See if there is a Xerces JAR file in the "ext" directory of your java VM. You can work around this by omitting the ext directory from the boot classpath, as in :

eclipse -vmargs -Djava.ext.dirs=

Eclipse fails to start with InvocationTargetException

If you tried to start Eclipse and you got something like this in the log:

java.lang.reflect.InvocationTargetException

        at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)

        at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke

(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:39)

        at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke

(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:25)

        at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:324)

        at org.eclipse.core.launcher.Main.basicRun(Main.java:248)

Then there is a good chance that you installed a newer version of eclipse on top of an older version. This is not supported. You must install a new build into an empty directory. Please see the extended upgrade discussion

Eclipse fails to start with NoClassDefFoundError.

It is possible that the zip file you downloaded got corrupted during transfer. Another problem is if you unzipped using WinZip on a windows machine and then copied the files to a unix machine. This can cause file name cases to be changed and permissions to be lost. Instead, you should use "unzip" on the unix machine where you intend to run.

Eclipse can't find SWT on linux

If eclipse fails to start, and it complains that it couldn't find SWT or the SWT libraries, perhaps you downloaded the wrong eclipse for your particular windowing system. There are different downloads for GTK versus motif. If you have both windowing systems installed, you may have to force eclipse to use a particular windowing system using either "eclipse -ws gtk" or "eclipse -ws motif".

Eclipse can't start with java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError

Eclipse splash screen stuck on desktop with error like this.

java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: /opt/eclipse/plugins/org.eclipse.swt.gtk_2.0.0/os /linux/x86/libswt-pi-gtk-2047.so: libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
at java.lang.ClassLoader$NativeLibrary.load(Native Method)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadLibrary0(ClassLoader.jav a:1480)
at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadLibrary(ClassLoader.java :1388)
at java.lang.Runtime.loadLibrary0(Runtime.java:772) ...
...

On SuSE 8.0, j2sdk 1.4.0_01, Eclipse 2.0 GTK version

When using Motif, the problem is manifested by the following error message:

eclipse: error while loading shared libraries: eclipse: undefined symbol: _XmStrings

On RedHat 7.2, I was able to get rid of the same problem above by going to the installation directory of Eclipse and starting it from there. That is:

$ cd /opt/eclipse2-gtk
$ ./eclipse -data /home/jpaganini/workspace

The problem seems to be related to an incorrect or missing LD_LIBRARY_PATH setting. On RedHat 7.3, I solve the problem by doing

export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:/home/rprice/bin/eclipse

as the previous poster suggested. This allows me to start up Eclipse from the command line. However, it still fails (silently) when I create a shortcut in KDE3. Any ideas?

Works for me with this script (perhaps adding the OS and ARCH params helped):

JAVA=/opt/jdks/jdk1.4.2_01/jre/bin/java
VM_ARGS="-showversion -Xmx400m -Xms64m"

WS=gtk
#WS=motif
OS=linux
ARCH=x86

WORKSPACE=~/eclipseworkspaces/java

ECLIPSE_ARGS="-os ${OS} -arch ${ARCH} -ws ${WS} -data ${WORKSPACE} -consolelog"

#call eclipse directly
${JAVA} ${VM_ARGS} -cp /opt/eclipse/current/eclipse/startup.jar org.eclipse.core.launcher.Main ${ECLIPSE_ARGS}

#alternatively: start up the eclipse binary

#/opt/eclipse/current/eclipse/eclipse -vm ${JAVA} ${ECLIPSE_ARGS} -showsplash 600 -vmargs ${VM_ARGS}

Last Modified 10/2/06 11:46 AM

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