Customer Reviews

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Java 1.2

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is the fourth book I've looked at in my quest to learn Java. I started with Laura Lemays book which I got from the library but ditched it as soon as received my copy of "Beginning Java 2" from Amazon. I have a little programming experience from twenty years ago so I'm essentially starting at ground zero. Lemay states right off the bat that her book is directed at those with oop programming experience. Many people have reviewed the "Beginning Java 2" book as good for beginners but I had to look to other books by the end of Chapter 3. The examples for me were getting too long with too much left unexplained for me. The phrase,"you'll learn this in a later chapter" was happening too much. I moved to a book "Java !" and stayed with it for as long as I could follow it but moved to "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Java 1.2". For the most part the author thoroughly explains his examples and doesn't just skip over parts and say, "we'll get to that later." I plan on getting back to "Beginning Java 2" but I find I'm needing these other books to fill in the gaps. For me, the Idiot's Guide has been the best intro into Java for me.

I am trying to learn Java and found it a little difficult. I wanted to buy another book instead of my swedish one. I found this title sounding funny. A Complete Idiot is worse than a dummy. I like the writng style of this author. He writes in a very entertaining way and uses allegories to explain things. This he does very well. What I miss in this book is exercises. It is difficult to learn anything by just reading ready code. And the programming code in the end is not for a beginner. When you try to learn something you want to have everything explained. But the difficult code in the end ot the book is only partly explained. That is a minus for still a good book.

Unless you have some former knowledge in OOP and a little more than basic understanding of programming for the Internet, you'll consider yourself an even bigger idiot if/when you reach the end of the book. The chapters are very short and cover vast amounts of knowledge with very little words to explain it. You end up with a handfull of jokes but less than a nutshell of Java. A newbie in programming? this book is not for you. Don't have enough laughter in your life? you might just find this a bargain. :)

I'm an Idiot, so, I know what I'm, talking about. In an Idiot's book the writing style should be concise-it wasn't. He went into irrelevant analogies which just bored, he repeated himself, yes, he repeated himself. He introduces a new word and then defines it at the end of the paragraph. INTRODUCE-DEFINE-EXPLAIN-EXAMPLES-SUMMARISE

I'll read again

The writing style of the Author left a great deal to be desired. The writing style was very American (perfect for Americans) but many of the metaphors which he uses to convey concepts just made things harder. For example, he is trying to explain that "Run" and "Execute" are the same thing. To do this he uses a basket ball analogy, where a play is "Run" and afterwards people say it was well "Executed". Frankly, just telling me the two words meant the same thing was enough for me. The book also took too long to get into any detail. The pages were cluttered, having captions on almost every page which squeezed text and code into small (harder to read) sections. Otherwise the explanations were clear and there was enough source code for you to catch on. One large plus is the apparent lack of typos!!

I had done a distance learning course in HTML and, without any programming knowledge or experience, then sought to learn Java with a view to sitting the Sun Certfifcation Exam. Other books I tried I just couldn't get into because there was always prerequisite knowledge of programming. However, the Guide assumed nothing, explained each term / idea before dealing with it, and gave me the entry point I was looking for. There was even a crash course in HTML. The quirky humour and comic illustrations aided the assimilation of the language. If you are in a similar position to mine, then I recommend this book wholeheartedly. Magic !!!

I had done a distance learning course in HTML and, without any programming knowledge or experience, then sought to learn Java with a view to sitting the Sun Certfifcation Exam. Other books I tried I just couldn't get into because there was always prerequisite knowledge of programming. However, the Guide assumed nothing, explained each term / idea before dealing with it, and gave me the entry point I was looking for. There was even a crash course in HTML. The quirky humour and comic illustrations aided the assimilation of the language. If you are in a similar position to mine, then I recommend this book wholeheartedly. Magic !!!