Tail Console - User Guide

Version 1.0

Contents
  1. Overview
  2. Installation
  3. Opening a Tail Console
  4. Launch Configurations
  5. Contact
  6. License

Overview

Tail Console provides an Eclipse console that continuously outputs the contents of a (potentially growing) text file, similar to the GNU command tail.

For frequently used files, launch configurations can be created to quickly open a tail console without having to re-select the actual file from the file system.

Installation

Tail Console requires Java 6 and Eclipse 4.2 (Juno) or higher.

To install Tail Console from the Update Site, select Help/Software Updates/Available Software from your Eclipse menu and click Add Site to add the following URL:

http://eclipse.schedenig.name

You can now open the site in the list of available software, check Tail Console and click Install to begin the installation process.

Opening a Tail Console

A tail console can be opened via the New Console menu in Eclipse's console view. The menu provides an entry  Tail Console which will open the following dialogue:

The New Tail Console Dialogue

File allows you to select the text file that should be output in the console, either by typing or pasting the path to the file, by selecting a recent file from the drop down list, or by picking a file from the file system via a file open dialogue available through the Browse... button.

The Skip existing content checkbox controls whether the entire file or just content that is added after opening the console will be written to the console.

Launch Configurations

For frequently used files, launch configurations can be created in Eclipse's Run Configurations dialogue. In a launch configurations, the same options as in the New Console dialogue are available.

If the Grep Console plug-in is installed, it also contributes a settings tab to the launch configuration. Tail consoles are fully supported by Grep Console.

Contact

Tail Console websites:

Tail Console was written by Marian Schedenig. You can find my website here.

License

Clippets is licensed under the terms of the Eclipse Public License v1.0.

Copyright © 2014 Marian Schedenig.