The term used to represent the entire UI is workbench. The workbench itself has no physical manifestation, but the workbench object is used to access most of the general APIs and services available in the generic UI. The workbench is displayed in one or more workbench windows. These basic top-level windows make up an Eclipse application. Note that dialogs, wizards, and other transient pop-ups are not called workbench windows.
The main body of a workbench window is represented by the workbench page, which in turn is made up of workbench parts, which come in two varieties: views and editors (to be done). The initial size and orientation of the parts in the page are determined by a perspective.
Parts interact with the rest of the window via their site. The site is not a visible entity but simply an API mechanism to separate the methods that operate on the view from the methods that operate on controls and services outside the view. This allows the workbench implementers to add new features to the sites without breaking all the plug-ins that implement the parts. The figure below shows how a view (MyView) and an editor (MyEditor) each has its own site, which is hosted by a page, inside a workbench window, owned by the workbench.
workbench/views class diagram to be done
What is a View?
At their most basic, views are simply a subclass of the Echo2 Component class, containing arbitrary controls below a title bar. The title bar contains the view name and an area for toolbar buttons (to be done).
A view interacts with the rest of the workbench via its site. Browse through the interfaces IViewSite, IWorkbenchPartSite, and IWorkbenchSite to see what site services are available to a view.
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