(Tutorial in the making...)
Eclipse offers a very good development environment with numerous features, however setting it correctly is sometimes frustrating. Once it is done, it make the workflow quite simple. So let's set it up and see how it goes!

The first thing that needs to be done is to set-up ESP-IDF and ensure that all the dependencies are taken care of. Check the detailed tutorial on setting up ESP-IDF to get that done.

The ESP-IDF is setup in such a way that you can develop your application without modifying the ESP-IDF files. The application can reside in a completely separate directory from the ESP-IDF files. This allows the ESP-IDF core files to be updated independently of the application. We will be configuring the same 01_hello_world example from the above tutorial.

Ensure that the tool-chain works from command line, before proceeding with this tutorial. In fact this tutorial uses the makefile setup from the previous tutorial to configure the tool-chain.

Download and Install Eclipse C/C++ IDE

To get started download the latest eclipse IDE for C/C++

http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/packages/eclipse-ide-cc-developers-includes-incubating-components/indigosr2

Create a New Project

All the images below have steps marked with numbers, please perform them in a series. To start with

Select the project type as Empty Project
Toolchains as Cross GCC
Uncheck Use Default Location
Enter the project Name as 01_hello_world

Setup Environment Variables

These variables are setup to tell eclipse where the tool-chain and the ESP-IDF core is located.

Right Click on the Project Name.
Select Properties.

To add the environment variables:

Expand C/C++ Build and click on Environment
Click on the Add Button as shown below. Also notice that the IDE picks up some variable from the make file

Click on the “Environment” properties page under “C/C++ Build”. Click “Add...” and enter name V and value 1.
Click “Add...” again, and enter name IDF_PATH. The value should be the full path where ESP-IDF is installed. Windows users: Use forward-slashes not backslashes for this path, ie C:/Users/MyUser/Development/esp-idf.