Java: A Beginner's Guide, Sixth Edition

excellent beginners guide to java and OO programming. the author was very disciplined in maintaining a 1-thing-at-a-time style. his frequent instructions to "don't worry about ... for now...we'll cover that later" allows the reader to focus on the current topic. well written, well paced, with great examples and exercises.

Schildt is quite simply the best author to use to learn how to program in C, C++, Java, or C#. His books are very clear for a beginner, yet not too verbose like many of the other books out there. What really distinguishes this book from other similar ones is that the reader walks away from this book with a feeling of mastery of the topics covered and the confidence to be able to implement them appropriately. Many other introductory books breeze over important topics or explain them in a way that beginners find difficulty in understanding. This is far from the case with this book. Schildt has written an excellent series of books that I can easily say, taught me the foundations of programming in each respective language. Now if he only wrote guides for python and perl too...

This is an amazing book. I retired from engineering research 16 years ago and have not done any programming since. Things have changed a lot! (all for the better). This book has an excellent teaching style, thorough and clear. It was my second book on Java, the first being Barry Burd's "Beginning Programming with Java for Dummies". That book is a good foundational start but it has not quite kept up with the rapid pace in the development of Java. Schildt's book is up to date (JDK 6 and Java SE 6) and makes a great reference work on the subject. I recommend it highly.

I read this book to get a good start with Java. It's an excellent book to pick up if you have little/no java background or if it's been a while. I used this to build my foundation then went through a certification book and passed the scjp 5.

Some computer books are nothing but dry text, and others are so full of intense graphics that your eyes burn. This book strikes an ideal balance between those extremes. The teaching style is engaging, and there's also plenty of reference material, making this a great book to start with and keep handy as you advance.