Perspectives include combinations of views and editors that are suited to performing a particular set of tasks. For example, you normally open the Flex Debugging perspective to debug your Flex application.

For an overview of perspectives, see About Flex Builder perspectives.

Opening and switching perspectives

When you open a file that is associated with a particular perspective, Flex Builder automatically opens that perspective. You can also open a perspective manually. The stand-alone configuration of Flex Builder contains three perspectives:

• Flex Development
• Flex Debugging
• Flex Profiling (available on a trial basis or complete with Flex Builder Professional)

 Select Window > Perspective or choose Other to access all other Eclipse perspectives. (In the plug-in configuration of Flex Builder, you select Window > Open Perspective.)

You can also click the Open Perspective button in the upper-right corner of the workbench window, then select a perspective from the pop-up menu.

To see a complete list of perspectives, select Other from the Open Perspective pop-up menu.

When the perspective opens, its title changes to display the name of the perspective you selected. An icon appears next to the title, allowing you to quickly switch back and forth between perspectives in the same window. By default, perspectives open in the same window. To open perspectives in a new window, edit preferences.

Setting the default perspective

The default perspective is indicated by the word default in parentheses following the perspective name.

1. Open the Preferences dialog and select General > Perspectives.
2. Under Available Perspectives, select the perspective to define as the default, and click Make Default.
3. Click OK.

Opening perspectives in a new window

You can change the default behavior for opening perspectives to open a perspective in a new window.

1. Open the Preferences dialog and select General > Perspectives.
2. Under Open a New Perspective, select In A New Window.

   To switch back to the default, select In The Same Window.

3. Click OK.

Customizing a perspective

To modify a perspective's layout, you change the editors and views that are visible in a given perspective. For example, you could have the Bookmarks view visible in one perspective, and hidden in another perspective.

You can also configure several other aspects of a perspective, including the File > New submenu, the Window > Perspective > Other submenu, the Window > Other Views submenu, and action sets (buttons and menu options) that appear in the toolbar and in the main menu items. (Menu names differ slightly in the plug-in configuration of Flex Builder.)

Create a new perspective

1. Open an existing perspective.
2. Show views and editors as desired.

   For more information, see Opening views, and Opening files for editing.

3. Select Window > Perspective > Save Perspective As (Window > Save Perspective As in the plug-in configuration of Flex Builder).
4. In the Save Perspective As dialog box, enter a new name for the perspective, then click OK.

Configure a perspective

1. Open the perspective to configure.
2. Select Window > Perspective > Customize Perspective (Window > Customize Perspective in the plug-in configuration of Flex Builder).
3. Click the Shortcuts tab or the Commands tab, depending on the items you want to add to your customized perspective.
4. Use the check boxes to select which elements to see on menus and toolbars in the selected perspective.
5. Click OK.
6. Select Window > Perspective > Save Perspective As (Window > Save Perspective As in the plug-in configuration of Flex Builder).
7. In the Save Perspective As dialog box, enter a new name for the perspective and click OK.

When you save a perspective, Flex Builder adds the name of the new perspective to the Window > Perspective menu (Window > Open Perspective in the plug-in configuration of Flex Builder).

Deleting a customized perspective

You can delete perspectives that were previously defined. You cannot delete a perspective you did not create.

1. Open the Preferences dialog and select General > Perspectives.
2. Under Available Perspectives, select the perspective you want to delete.
3. Click Delete, then click OK.

Resetting perspectives

You can restore a perspective to its original layout after you made changes to it.

1. Open the Preferences dialog and select General > Perspectives.
2. Under Available perspectives, select the perspective to reset.
3. Click Reset, then click OK.