OsgiEquinox / Eclipse plugin provides hotswap support for Eclipse plugin or platform development (Do not confuse it with common development in Eclipse!).
Following options should be setup in eclipse.ini for debugee Eclipse instance:
# use application classloader for the framework
-Dosgi.frameworkParentClassloader=app
# development classpath that is added to each plugin classpath
-Dosgi.dev=[extra_classpath]
# use dcevm as JVM
-XXaltjvm=dcevm
# enable hotswapagent
-javaagent:PATH_TO_AGENT/hotswap-agent.jar
# enable remote debugging on port 8000
-agentlib:jdwp=transport=dt_socket,server=y,suspend=n,address=8000
extra_classpath points to directory with compiled classes. When a new class is compiled it is sent by remote debugger to HotswapAgent. HotswapAgent stores this file into extra_classpath directory.
It is also necessary to setup following hotswap-agent.properties:
extraClasspath=[extra_classpath]
osgiEquinox.debugMode=true
then connect the IDE debugger (eclipse, netbeans or idea) to port 8000 and happy hotswapping!