Views are one of the two kinds of parts that make up a workbench window. At their most basic, views are simply a subclass of the SWT Composite class, containing arbitrary controls below a title bar. The title bar contains the view name, an area for toolbar buttons, and one or two drop-down menus. The drop-down menu on the upper left is simply the standard shell menu with actions for moving, resizing, and closing the view. The menu on the upper right and the button area are the view's action bar and may contain arbitrary actions defined by the implementer of that view.
A view interacts with the rest of the workbench via its site. Browse through the interfaces IViewSite, IWorkbenchPartSite, and IWorkbenchSite to see what site services are available to a view.