M. le Rutte said
I had hoped to find in this book the things I had not found out between the weeks I was started using Eclipse and the arrival of the book. I thought that it would detail in to the nitty gritty details that cost you hours to find out.
Even though it covers Eclipse it seems more a Java programmer manual. The examples used in the book are a speech synthesis program and some Eclipse plugins. The problem is that way to many pages cover the code of the examples and the way to program them.
If I had wanted to find out about those thing I would have bought a book about that. I wanted a book that told me about Eclipse, not about how to write a program.
Warren M. Sirota said
I'm no Java jock, though I have done small projects in it and know it enough to be a Java fan. I downloaded Eclipse and almost immediately was confused by the discrepancies in the tutorial with what I was seeing on the screen, so I bought this book. The introductory chapter alone was enough to give me a broad perspective on where I could go with Eclipse (and SWT and JFace), and the first couple of chapters got me started to the extent where I could easily proceed with my new project, run Junit tests within Eclipse, etc.
I think it's a fine book so far, for a person who already knows the basics of Java but doesn't need to be an expert. I find the whole Eclipse thing to be tremendously exciting, actually.
S. Blumberg said
This book does cover the material for RCP and version 3 so its more up to date than the earlier Eclipse in Action book by Gallardo et al, or the S. Holzner Eclipse book.
Something I've noticed when many programmers give public talks, like at EclipseCon, is that they skip-over the perspective and context and jump right into coding details.
This book too suffers from the LaundryList problem. Some chapters of Daum's book are more like a big list with only a sentence or two to frame them.
I appreciate that Daum is being comprehensive and so
the book comes of a bit like the manual you didn't get when you
'bought' eclipse. The book is worth having around for reference because its systematic and pretty complete. If you're looking to produce a proof-of-concept application in eclipse this book contains good examples of a stand-alone, plugin, and an rcp apps. This book is helpful in framing what you can learn from experimenting with eclipse.
Its a good reference book, but if you're lost in the wilderness trying to figure how to structure a larger application this book won't provide the persepective you need.
Thomas Duff said
There are definitely an abundance of books on Eclipse to choose from. One of the latest additions to the field, Professional Eclipse 3 for Java Developers by Berthold Daum (Wrox) is a nice new choice...
Chapter List: Introduction to Eclipse; Effective Programming with Eclipse; The Art of (Visual) Composition; Organizing Your Code; Project One: Duke Speaks; Project Development; Advanced Topics of Project Development; The SWT Library; JFace; Project Two: Jukebox; Developing Plug-ins for the Eclipse Platform; Developing Your Own Eclipse-Based Products; Project Three: A Spell Checker as an Eclipse Plug-in; The Rich Client Platform; Project Four: The Hex Game as a Rich Client Application; Conclusions and Outlook; Useful Plug-ins for Eclipse; Migrating Projects to a New Eclipse Version; Important Downloads; Bibliography; Index
There are a number of things I liked about this book. For one, it deals with the latest Eclipse release (version 3). Although it's not a major problem to mentally translate text between 2.1 and 3.0, it's still easier to learn if both the book and the student are on the same page. Next, Daum concentrates a lot on practicality. The four projects included in the book cover four of the major types of development you'd face as a Java developer. By using the projects during your learning, you should have a good grasp of Eclipse when you're finished. Finally, I appreciate the coverage of the Rich Client Platform. My personal opinion is that this feature of Eclipse is going to be a very big deal, and this book is one of the few that covers it in any detail.
So, if anyone were to ask me for a recommendation on a book for Eclipse, this book would be among the top of the list. It's good stuff.
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