Eventually I created a new project for something else and found the builder in it worked as expected, so I realized it was project specific. So I compared the .project files and was able to correct the corrupted one using the new one as a reference. Here is an example of how a .project file should look with just the default Java builder:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<projectDescription>
	<name>HelloWorld</name>
	<comment></comment>
	<projects>
	</projects>
	<buildSpec>
		<buildCommand>
			<name>org.eclipse.jdt.core.javabuilder</name>
			<arguments>
			</arguments>
		</buildCommand>
	</buildSpec>
	<natures>
		<nature>org.eclipse.jdt.core.javanature</nature>
	</natures>
</projectDescription>

In the above example I have removed my custom builders to focus on the built in one, they would each be listed as extra buildCommand entries in the parent buildSpec node. In my corrupted copy I had several argument and trigger values that were unnecessary. Just for comparison, here is the buildCommand for my custom Windows 7 builder:

<buildCommand>
	<name>org.eclipse.ui.externaltools.ExternalToolBuilder</name>
	<triggers>full,incremental,</triggers>
	<arguments>
		<dictionary>
			<key>LaunchConfigHandle</key>
			<value>&lt;project&gt;/.externalToolBuilders/Win7_Builder.launch</value>
		</dictionary>
	</arguments>
</buildCommand>

Hope this helps someone else out there! And stay tuned, as I’ll be releasing my custom build script very soon for those who may be interested

The error gave a good indication as to what the issue was, so I simply opened up the installation folder (in my case it was C:\Program Files (x86)\Notepad++\) and inspected the langs.xml file. At first everything looked normal, but once I reached the end of the file I noticed it’s abrupt ending; something had caused every character after a certain point to just vanish. None of the XML tags were closed properly as a result. Unsure of what would happen if I just removed this file, I renamed it to langs.xml.bak and reloaded Notepad++. The program loaded without any errors and silently recreated the langs.xml file from scratch. Problem solved!

A Java Runtime Environment (JRE) or Java Development Kit (JDK) must be available in order to run Eclipse. No Java virtual machine was found after searching the following locations:
c:\Program Files\Eclipse\jre\bin\javaw.exe 'javaw.exe' in your current path

I have Java installed, and it is working properly. It was a big pain to get working properly the first time with NetBeans so I was worried that if I tweaked it to work with Eclipse I may end up with it not working in either. I took a peek into many of the config files for Eclipse and didn’t see an option to set the path for javaw.exe, so I made use of my Google-Fu skills and found the following solution:

• Right Click Eclipse.exe and select Create Shortcut
• Right Click the new shortcut and select Properties
• At the end of the target path, add the parameter -vm and then the path to your javaw.exe
  ie: “C:\Program Files\eclipse\eclipse.exe” -vm C:\Java\jdk1.6.0_13\bin
• Hit Ok, then run Eclipse from your new shortcut

Problem solved!

“This client is too old to work with the working copy “C:\path\to\repository.” You need to get a newer Subversion client, or downgrade this working copy. See http://subversion.tigris.org/faq.html#working-copy-format-change for details.”

This error was somewhat misleading, as the site it provided didn’t offer me any insight as to why it was happening. I had the newest version of TortoiseSVN and the error wasn’t happening with any of my Visual Basic or PHP projects, just the Java project. Eventually it dawned on me what was causing this. NetBeans IDE has built in support for Subversion which uses the CollabNet Subversion client. When I was working within the NetBeans IDE the CollabNet client was working behind the scenes and changing files within the .svn folder on my system. When the time came for me to check in my changes through TortoiseSVN I would get the not so helpful error message.

After a quick Google search I found the solution on the NetBeans Forums. In the NetBeans IDE go to Tools->Plugins then under the Installed tab check Subversion and hit Uninstall. The plugin will be removed and you will be prompted to restart the IDE.