p2 can update your eclipse.ini

I regularly switch my base SDK install to try out new developer integration builds, and it's not to much trouble to get it set up correctly thanks to p2 and the director.

eclipse/eclipse \
-application org.eclipse.equinox.p2.director \
-noSplash \
-repository \
http://download.eclipse.org/eclipse/updates/4.2-I-builds,\
http://download.eclipse.org/e4/updates/0.12-I-builds,\
http://download.eclipse.org/releases/juno,\
http://download.eclipse.org/tools/orbit/downloads/drops/R20110523182458/repository \
-installIUs \
org.apache.commons.jxpath/1.3.0.v200911051830,\
org.apache.batik.xml/1.6.0.v201011041432,\
org.dojotoolkit/1.6.1.v201105210659,\
org.eclipse.nebula.widgets.gallery/1.0.0.R_0_20090212,\
org.eclipse.egit.feature.group,\
org.eclipse.jgit.feature.group,\
org.eclipse.emf.sdk.feature.group,\
org.eclipse.xtext.sdk.feature.group,\
org.eclipse.wst.xml_ui.feature.feature.group

As you can see I use the director to set up my eclipse/running target with orbit bundles I need, with EGit, and with SDKs that I need like EMF, XText, XML Editors and Tools. I love a good automated process.

With all functionality in use and with 23 platform and e4 git repositories for EGit/JGit to work through, it's easy to get an OOME with eclipse default settings. Because I'm testing downloads instead of upgrades, that means I have to update my eclipse.ini every time. It's minor, but it breaks the automated process.

Since p2 provides the touchpoints that can modify the eclipse.ini already, it should be simple to hand-craft a local repo with an IU that can update the eclipse.ini as part of my director call.

   <unit id='toolingorg.eclipse.e4.fix.jvmArg' version='4.2.0.I20120131-2200' singleton='false'>
      <provides size='2'>
        <provided namespace='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.iu' name='toolingorg.eclipse.e4.fix.jvmArg' version='4.2.0.I20120131-2200'/>
        <provided namespace='toolingorg.eclipse.sdk.ide' name='org.eclipse.e4.fix.jvmArg' version='4.2.0.I20120131-2200'/>
      </provides>
      <requires>
        <required namespace='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.iu' name='org.eclipse.sdk.ide' range='[0.0.0,5.0.0)'/>
      </requires>
      <touchpoint id='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.osgi' version='1.0.0'/>
      <touchpointData size='1'>
        <instructions size='2'>
          <instruction key='unconfigure'>
            addJvmArg(jvmArg:-Xms40m);addJvmArg(jvmArg:-Xmx384m);removeJvmArg(jvmArg:-Xms64m);removeJvmArg(jvmArg:-Xmx1024m);
          </instruction>
          <instruction key='configure'>
            removeJvmArg(jvmArg:-Xms40m);removeJvmArg(jvmArg:-Xmx384m);addJvmArg(jvmArg:-Xms64m);addJvmArg(jvmArg:-Xmx1024m);
          </instruction>
        </instructions>
      </touchpointData>
    </unit>

I added a .feature.group IU to make it stand out that the fix has been installed into this version of eclipse, and voila.