How does the m2e eclipse plugin interact with eclipse?

Question

I am an eclipse power and who has ignored maven due to the historically poor maven / eclipse integration. m2e seems to be maturing and I am taking it out for a serious test

Answer 1

I have found the details I was looking for in a Presentation from Eclipse Con titled "m2e, an exercise in mixing oil and water"

http://www.eclipsecon.org/europe2012/sites/eclipsecon.org.europe2012/files/EclipseConEU2012-m2e-talk.pdf

Abstract:

m2e is a popular Eclipse IDE plugin with stated project goal "to provide a first-class Apache Maven support in the Eclipse IDE". In this talk I will give an overview of Maven/Eclipse integration approach implemented by m2e, highlight differences between Maven and Eclipse that make proper integration difficult or impossible and will discuss possible ways to improve the integration. The talk is targeted at Eclipse and Maven developers who want to better understand challenges of Maven/Eclipse integration and advanced m2e users who want to know what happens "under the hood".