Java: Practical Guide for Programmers

Java: Practical Guide for Programmers (The Practical Guides)
By Michael Sikora


Publisher: Morgan Kaufmann
Number Of Pages: 150
Publication Date: 2002-12-23
ISBN-10 / ASIN: 1558609091
ISBN-13 / EAN: 9781558609099
Binding: Paperback


Book Description:

If you're an experienced programmer, you already have a rock-solid foundation for learning Java. All you need is a resource that takes your experience into account and explains Java's key principles and techniques in an intelligent, efficient way.

Java: Practical Guide for Programmers is precisely that resource. Here, you won't have to wade through hundreds of pages of overly simplistic material to learn the basics of Java programming. Instead, you get highly focused instruction in the core elements of Java 1.4, accompanied by carefully chosen examples and line-by-line analyses that are right to the point. You'll be astonished at how soon you can begin productive coding in Java, and how quickly your skills will progress.

Web resources:
Source code from the book is no longer available at
http://www.zm.sikora.btinternet.co.uk/source.html
Please press the 'Companion Page' button on the upper right side of this page to access a zip file containing it.

Sun J2SE download page
http://java.sun.com/j2se/downloads.html

Sun J2SE API documentation
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/docs/index.html

* Written expressly for people who already know a procedural or object-oriented programming language.
* Takes a concise approach designed to make the most of the experience you already have.
* Covers the core elements of Java 1.4, including language syntax, OO features, collections, exception handling, input/output, threads, event handling, and Swing components.
* Filled with incisive coding examples and line-by-line analyses.
* Via a companion Web site, provides downloadable example code and links to additional resources.



Summary: A CONCISE Java Grammar!
Rating: 5

I love this little one. From time to time, between working through and losing myself in half dozen or more heavy tomes of Java book, I would come back to this little one to get a grip of fundamentals and essentials. The book is concise and no nonsensical. I also like the banking application sample code. Practical enough. Who doesn't bank?


Summary: Good for experienced coders
Rating: 4

As the book's title shows, it's just a guide, a simple guide that you can not expect too much details out from it. Before learning Java, I am a Delphi coder. So, I was looking for some book to transfer me from Delphi to Java quickly. Within merely 170-odd pages, Sikora brings you an overview of the Java language. I think this guide just right fits my taste. Another thing to be mentioned, if you are a serious coder, a detailed reference is necessary. As what I am doing now, Java 2, The Complete Reference is by far the most suitable book for me, after I have an bird's eye view from Sikora's guide.


Summary: quickly learn Java?
Rating: 4

Indeed, Sikora offers a quick start to learning Java. He eshews an exhaustive enumeration of every core class in J2SE. Instead, he takes several high level topics and explains which common classes deal with these. A question arises. Can you indeed learn Java from so slender a book? Perhaps. Sikora teaches a core functionality. Made easier if you have already programmed in some other language.

For graphics, he leads you right into Swing. No time wasted on the earlier and inferior AWT classes.

For input/output, Java is more powerful than C or C++, but concomitantly harder to use. The coding is far more verbose, compared to a simple printf() or scanf() in C, for example. The minimal descriptions in Java given here are admirable in how he found the essence of enough to be useful.


Summary: Java for self-starters
Rating: 5

If I could only recommend one book to an experienced programmer who wanted to learn Java it would be this one. It's only 170 pages long and it doesn't contain anything that's unnecessary. But it does cover syntax, flow control, classes and methods, inheritance, exception handling, file I/O, GUI's, collections and threads. That's genuinely Java in a nutshell.

The author can offer such a stripped-down book, of course, because he assumes that the reader already understands programmatic flow control and objects, and can follow a basic inheritance hierarchy without tedious explanation.

Java isn't a difficult language: it can merely be made to seem so by textbooks that bury simple facts under mountains of verbiage. I hope other authors will take Zbigniew Sikora's "Java: Practical Guide for Programmers" as a model for textbooks for busy people.

Other Java Books : 
Java: Практическо ръководство за програмисти (Практическите ръководства).
爪哇：实用指南程序员（实用指南） 。
爪哇：實用指南程序員（實用指南） 。
Java: Guia pràctica per als programadors (els guies pràctiques).
Java: Praktični vodič za Programeri (praktičnog vodiča).
Java: Practical Guide for programmører (Den praktiske vejledninger).
Java: Praktische Gids voor programmeurs (De praktische gidsen).