Customizing the appearance of the visual editor for Java

You can control how and whether views and palettes are displayed in the visual editor.

By default, the visual editor for Java shows the Design and Source views on a split pane, and the component palette is collapsed against the right side of the Design view. If you prefer to have more screen space for your work, you can stack the Design and Source views on separate tabs, rather than tiling them. You can also move the divider to show more or less of the Source view. In addition, you can resize the palette by dragging its border, or you can show or hide it by clicking the small arrow at the top of the palette.

  1. Specify general appearance preferences using the visual editor Preferences page (Window > Preferences to open the Preferences window, and go to the Java > Visual Editor):
    1. On the Appearance tab, specify whether you want the Design and Source views to be tiled (Above each other with a split pane) or stacked (On separate notebook tabs). This preference goes into effect the next time you open a Java file.
    2. Select Open Properties view to automatically display the Properties view when the editor opens.
    3. Select Open Java Beans view to automatically display the Java Beans view when the editor opens.
    4. Click OK to apply your preferences and close the Preferences window.
  2. Open a Java file in the visual editor and customize the appearance and layout of the visual editor:
    1. Click and drag the divider between the Design and Source views, or use the arrows on the divider, to adjust the size of the Design and Source views. For example, if you are not looking at the code at all, you can collapse the divider by clicking the small down arrow.
    2. Drag the border of the palette to adjust its width, or use the small arrow at the top of the palette to collapse or open the palette. For example, if you have finished adding components to your Java class, you can close the palette to give you more design area to work with.

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