Bug 33628 [Preferences] provide API for showing a specified preference page
There is no way for a plugin to open the (workbench) preference dialog with a certain peference page selected. Enabling this would allow plugins to refer the user to a certain preference page, for example when a misconfiguration is detected during execution of an action. Also this enables developers to write a new search panel to find a text in the preference pages and get the user right there. A method select(IPreferencePage page), select(IPreferenceNode node) or select(String path) in org.eclipse.jface.preference.PreferenceDialog would help.
bundles/org.eclipse.jface/src/org/eclipse/jface/preference/PreferenceDialog.java
layout.marginHeight = 0;
		layout.marginWidth = 0;
		layout.verticalSpacing = 0;
		layout.horizontalSpacing = 0;
		titleComposite.setLayout(layout);
		titleComposite.setLayoutData(new GridData(GridData.FILL_HORIZONTAL));
		createTitleArea(titleComposite);
		
		pageContainer = createPageContainer(pageAreaComposite);
		pageContainer.setLayoutData(new GridData(GridData.FILL_BOTH));
		
		Label separator = new Label(pageAreaComposite, SWT.HORIZONTAL
				| SWT.SEPARATOR);
		GridData gd = new GridData(GridData.FILL_HORIZONTAL);
		separator.setLayoutData(gd);
		return composite;
	}
	/**
	 * Creates the inner page container.
	 * 
	 * @param parent
	 * @return Composite
	 */
	private Composite createPageContainer(Composite parent) {
		Composite result = new Composite(parent, SWT.NULL);
		result.setLayout(new PageLayout());
		return result;
	}
	/**
	 * Creates the wizard's title area.