Launching Eclipse OSGi Framework from the command line

I'm currently playing with OSGi. There are two Open Source implementations (Oscar and Knoplerfish) you can use.

Another Open Source OSGi framework is provided by Eclipse since its 3.0 release.

To launch its OSGi framework without starting all Eclipse:

1. put in your classpath all the jars in $ECLIPSE_HOME/plugins/org.eclipse.osgi_3.1.0/

2. start the framework with

   java -classpath $CLASSPATH \ -Dosgi.framework="file://$ECLIPSE_HOME/plugins/org.eclipse.osgi_3.1.0" \
   org.eclipse.osgi.framework.launcher.Launcher -console

You then have the framework started:

osgi> status
Framework is shutdown.    

id      Bundle Location
State       Bundle File Name
0       System Bundle
  STARTING    org.eclipse.osgi.framework.adaptor.core.SystemBundleData@17f1ba3
Registered Services
{org.eclipse.osgi.framework.console.CommandProvider}=
  {service.ranking=2147483647, service.id=1}    

osgi> launch    

osgi> ss    

Framework is launched.    

id      Type    State       Bundle
0               ACTIVE     System Bundle [0]    

osgi>

It is then ready to install and start new bundles (e.g. available from Oscar Bundle Repository):

osgi> install http://oscar-osgi.sf.net/repo/log/log.jar
Bundle id is 2    

osgi> start 2    

osgi> status
Framework is launched.    

id      Bundle Location
State       Bundle File Name
0       System Bundle
  ACTIVE     org.eclipse.osgi.framework.adaptor.core.SystemBundleData@17f1ba3
2       http://oscar-osgi.sf.net/repo/log/log.jar
  ACTIVE     http://oscar-osgi.sf.net/repo/log/log.jar
Registered Services
{org.eclipse.osgi.framework.console.CommandProvider}=
  {service.ranking=2147483647, service.id=1}
{org.osgi.service.packageadmin.PackageAdmin}=
  {service.ranking=2147483647, service.id=2, service.vendor=Eclipse.org,   
   service.pid=0.org.eclipse.osgi.framework.internal.core.PackageAdminImpl}
{org.osgi.service.startlevel.StartLevel}=
  {service.ranking=2147483647, service.id=3, service.vendor=Eclipse.org, 
   service.pid=0.org.eclipse.osgi.framework.internal.core.StartLevelManager}
{org.osgi.service.log.LogService}=
  {service.id=4}
{org.osgi.service.log.LogReaderService}=
  {service.id=5}    

osgi>