Perspectives and views

A perspective defines the initial layout of views in an Eclipse workbench window. Each perspective provides a set of functions for accomplishing a specific type of task, or works with specific types of resources. For example, the Java™ perspective combines views commonly used while editing Java source files, and the Debug perspective contains the views for debugging Java programs.

Perspectives control what appears in certain menus and toolbars. Perspectives also define visible action sets, which you can change to customize a perspective. You can save a perspective that you build this way, making a custom perspective that you can open again later.