I want a single Maven module (parent POM) configured, that shows all of the child modules underneath it, but this does not seem to work correctly in Eclipse. For example, the open type (ctrl+shift+t) does not work because Eclipse does not detect source files under the parent POM. The only way parent/child modules seem to work is if I import every module as an independent project. We have 10+ child modules in our parent, and if I want to have multiple releases of the parent in a single workspace it gets even worse because all the child modules show up as projects.
After a lot of research, including trying a similar approach with Netbeans, it is simply not possible. Parent POMs are treating as such, and each module needs to be loaded as a "top level" project in order for the IDEs to recognize the source.