Sams Teach Yourself Java 2 in 21 Days [With CD-ROM]

One would get very tired lifting all of the beginning Java books currently on the market. The combination of weight and numbers can be overwhelming to someone looking for a book to use in their initial study of the language. As more features are added and considered fundamental, it becomes harder for the author of any book based on a time frame to pick the "essential" topics and cover them in sufficient detail. Therefore, the end result is that all books based on an elapsed time should have the time considered as a guideline rather than as an absolute and that type of book should not be judged too harshly in this area. With that as a precept, the questions to resolve are threefold. Did the authors choose the appropriate topics?Are the starting points in a location appropriate for beginners? Is the coverage sufficient so that the student will have some significant grasp of Java after they complete the book? In this case, all the answers are most definitely affirmative. Cadenhead and Lemay begin with the basics of the fundamental data types, expressions and operators. These concepts are then used to construct simple classes, which are then put together to make other classes via inheritance and interface implementation. Classes are then grouped together to make packages, and the implementation details of import and setting the CLASSPATH environment variable are examined. The first week ends with a lesson covering how to work with threads and exceptions. Week two is devoted to creating GUI interfaces, handling events and drawing objects, with the topic of the final day being the construction and use of applets. Week three is devoted to some additional basic and advanced topics. Day 15 covers input/output, day 16 describes the serialization and inspection of objects, day 17 shows you how to communicate across a network, on day 18 you work with sound, day 19 is an explanation of how to create and use JavaBeans, the coverage of day 20 is how to move data using JDBC and XML and day 21 covers how to write Java servlets and Java Server Pages (JSPs). The coverage of each of these topics is necessarily brief, and the authors do leave a lot of things out. Nevertheless, I am convinced that enough is covered so that the students leave with a basic grasp of how each concept is used to construct programs. Are there things that I would have done differently? Absolutely! I would have moved the coverage of input/output so that it was embedded inside the other lessons. Once classes and exceptions are covered, then sending data in and out of files can be done by adding only a few lines to programs whose primary purpose is to demonstrate other things. I would have made more effort to explain how threads can be used and abused in Java programs, covering them in a separate chapter. In conclusion, this is one of the best beginning Java books on the market. No such book is ever perfect, but this one is much closer to perfect than it is to merely adequate.

I cannot understand those people writing negative reviews about this book.I believe I can speak on behalf of many programmers new to JAVA. This book is one of the best, because after reading just six chapters, I'm now confident to say I know a lot about OOP, classes and methods. Let me tell you about my story. I bought "JAVA How to program" by Deitel, and after reading five chapters, I still cannot figure out what OOP is all about, the class and methods too.That book is good too, but the target audience is undefined, because the first couple of chapters dealed with GUI and structured programming a lot, without laying out the foundation of what classes, objects and methods of JAVA is all about. Then I remembered a friend who bought this SAMS book last year, so in desperation, I borrowed it and promised to return it after a few days, but failed to do so because I cannot put it down due to interesting topics and well laid out format. Now at home after coming from the office, even if i'm too tired, I can't help but read the book. I don't exaggerate, I just feel I owe this book a lot to post a comment and do the same good thing to other programmers new to JAVA by giving them this advise - BUY THIS BOOK, don't take my word for it, just try it and see what it can do for you. I'm still surfing the net for other references and would like to try Ivor Horton's book just for supplementary reference together with SAMS.

I am a mainframe programmer and I wanted to branch into Object Oriented Programming (OOP). This Java book is an excellent source for learning both Java Programming and OOP concepts. All of the code samples were great and the authors explained in detail what the code was actually doing. I was very pleased and would recommend all of the "Sams Teach Yourself..." books especially to beginners. I have also have the HTML and XML books and they are great as well.

I bought this book because I wanted to learn Java and I liked Laura Lemay's "Teach Yourself Web Publishing with HTML 4 in 21 Days." I knew C and a little C++ from doing some game programming and a class I had back in '96. I understand the flow and logic of programming in C and I was hoping I could carry it over to Java (since they are somewhat similar). This book took me step by step, chapter by chapter in understanding the true beauty of this language! It wasn't easy, mind you, but it wasn't overly difficult. If I didn't know C/C++, it would have been much tougher. I'd recommend complete beginner's go with the "Teach Yourself Java 2 in 24 Hours" book as some other reviewers have stated. If you know C/C++, this book is perfect! I'm glad I bought the book and it's going on my shelf for reference :).

I am a beginner in the world of programming. In addition, I know that Java is quite difficult to grasp. Thus, I knew it will take time for me to learn the language. When, I first read this book I had trouble understanding it. I was quite frustrated. However, I stuck with it and read it another time and another time. It took me about 21 days to read the book three times. Meanwhile, the Java light bulb in my head finally lit up. Nevertheless, here is my advice to the beginning Java programmers of the future:(1) BE PATIENT and eventually you will learn the language of Java. (2)Preview the chapters and read their summaries before studying them. (3) Read the parts or chapters of the book that were difficult to learn again and again, until you master them. (4)Try to understand and utilize rather than memorize the concepts of Java. (5) Read more than one related book on Java; you will realize that some books explain certain concepts of Java better than others and cover concepts of Java that some books fail to cover. Afterwards, you will agree that this book deserves 5 stars.