It looks like we may have a new contender in the ring for Eclipse Distros… however, I think it may be a bit more than that given what is stated in the article. An interesting quote:
Other features of the PoweredByPulse service include: a small initial installation footprint of 2MB; fast installations available through optimized use of mirrors and simultaneous downloading of components; rich user experience in Eclipse RCP (Rich Client Platform)-based client for a positive experience and ease of use; PoweredByPulse branding, along with maintaining product branding through use of ‘splash fades;’ desktop integration with customizable program group and desktop icons to enable fast profile launches; and cross-platform capability with Windows and Linux in November and Macintosh to follow.
It’s been a dream of mine to see a tiny initial Eclipse download that would sort of serve as an update manager. It would be able to browse a central repository of managed update information very quickly and allow users to download what they want. On top of that, it would allow users to manage flavors of Eclipse to launch based on a bundle pool. For example, if I had “WebTools”, “DataTools”, “PHPTools” and “C++Tools” installed, being able to easily launch an Eclipse with say only C++ tooling enabled and another “profile” for all my web-related development would be awesome. I usually find myself doing this manually with a ton of Eclipse installs and duplicated plug-ins 🙂
If Genuitec has indeed done this, then kudos to them, it’s much sooner than I’d envisioned it happening. I guess we will have to wait and see.