Leszek Gruchaa said
Courtesy of Blazej Ksycki from Szczecin JUG:
Learning Java from scratch isn't very difficult, but if you want to know all the good practices it can take quite a big amount of time and effort. The book Professional Java JDK 6 Edition" is here to help us out.
This book is very interesting and relates to quite a few issues. The first thing I found interesting were the differences between JDK 1.5 and JDK 1.6. Another subject is the design of web applications in two architecture models. This book also describes the basics of Enterprise Java Beans. Furthermore the reader will enter the world of many different, but very useful tools such as: Maven, TestNG or JMeter. Another very good chapter is about integrating Java and C++ using JNI (Java Native Interface). Everybody will find something interesting in this book. The number of problems this book is about is really impressive. But there is one thing missing - the J2ME technology.
All the texts in the book are described very clearly and they have very good examples. These examples are very helpful and allow you understand the meaning of the book quicker. However since the book is about many aspects of Java an doesn't concentrate only on one subject, some of the issues were described a bit to briefly. Sometimes when you read this book you get a feeling that there is something that this chapter lacks. When this happens unfortunately you have to find another book which is more specialized than this book.
At the end of the review you ask yourself one question - for who was this book written? The answer is frankly quite simple. For those people, who have some experience in Java and know the basic and now would like to continue their studies on Java, but don't know where to start their journey. Another group of readers that will the book useful are professional that would like to have some kind of quick reference guide. The book is really great and worth having but as for me it's a nice-to-have, but not a must-have. Still we have to remember that though this book is about different aspects of Java it won't replace a collection of more specialized books. But if had to give this book a grade it would be a B+, because of the drawbacks I mentioned above. However I think everyone should read this book - it's worth it!
Michael Ernest said
Professional Java attempts to do something I don't think any one book can do well, which is to say something useful on just about every topic. This book's sections include: important additions/changes to JDK 5; a whirlwind tour of project methodologies; design patterns; build tools; persistence tools; UIs; web applications; JNI; EJB 3; SOA; security; and packaging and deployment. The book wants to be a "one-stop shop," and that's fine. After reading through most of the sections and skimming some, however, I'm not sure what the profile of the target shopper might be.
The topic coverage varies wildly from section to section, in the writing style (and quality) and in the effectiveness of sample code to illustrates a point. Too often the descriptions are both verbose and phrased in the passive voice. Some code samples seem like proof-of-concept sketches of a feature or library facility, rather than a compelling example of its use. Still other samples seem full of boilerplate code that speeds up the page-turning but isn't illuminating. And sometimes the text changes its diction strangely; the style changes from a general description to a "follow-along" activity without warning. Some sentences sound as if the author left them in as a reminder to complete a task.
The result is a thick book that, for me, is sometimes tedious or exhausting to read. I think it would have been helpful to give author credit by chapter, if only to know the presentation might change significantly. Also, a concerted effort at paring things down, and keeping the diction clear and active, would help make it more readable and something worth referencing.
As mentioned, the topic coverage is quite broad. This book might come in handy to someone who just needs many topics in one book. So long as you don't need your one reference also for getting started, this book could be a useful collection.
J. Soetanto said
The book provide really helpful for you if you are trying to know more about Java after you have done it. It provides a lot of examples for doing one thing in different ways.
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