Eclipse Cookbook [Paperback]

Steve Holzner (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 28, 2004

You've probably heard the buzz about Eclipse, the powerful open source platform that gives Java developers a new way to approach development projects. It's like a shiny new car--no longer content to just admire Eclipse, you're now itching to get in and drive.

Eclipse is to Java developers what Visual Studio is to .NET developers--it's an integrated development environment (IDE) that combines a code editor, compiler, debugger, text editor, graphical user interface (GUI) builder, and other components into a single, user-friendly application. It provides a solid foundation that enables Java developers to construct and run integrated software-development tools for web development, application design, modeling, performance, testing, and much more.

As with any extensive programming tool, however, there's a lot to learn. And there s no better guy than well-known Java expert Steve Holzner to teach you. An award-winning and best-selling author who has been writing about Java topics since the language first appeared, Holzner delivers just the kind of targeted, practical, everyday knowledge you need to hone your mastery of Eclipse.

Perfect as a companion to an Eclipse programming tutorial (such as Holzner's own Eclipse, O'Reilly, April 2004) or an ideal stand-alone for all those developers who either don't want or don't need the tutorial approach, the Eclipse Cookbook contains task-oriented recipes for more than 800 situations you may encounter while using this new Java platform--from deploying a web application automatically to reverse engineering compiled code, from re-naming all references to a class across multiple packages to initializing the SWT JNI libraries.

Each recipe in the ever-popular and utterly practical problem-solution-discussion format for O'Reilly cookbooks contains a clear and thorough description of the problem, a brief but complete discussion of a solution, and in-action examples illustrating that solution. The Eclipse Cookbook will satiate Java programmers at all levels who are ready to go beyond tutorials--far beyond writing plug-ins and extensions--and actually use the powerful and convenient Eclipse day to day.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Steve Holzner is an award-winning author who has been writing about Java topics since Java first appeared. He's a former PC Magazine contributing editor, and his many books have been translated into 18 languages around the world. His books sold more than 1.5 million copies, and many of his bestsellers have been on Java. Steve graduated from MIT and got his PhD at Cornell; he's been a very popular member of the faculty at both MIT and Cornell, teaching thousands of students over the years and earning an average student evaluation over 4.9 out of 5.0. He also runs his own software company and teaches week-long classes to corporate programmers on Java around the country.

Product Details

• Paperback: 364 pages
• Publisher: O'Reilly Media (June 28, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0596007108
• ISBN-13: 978-0596007102
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #251,172 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Steven Holzner is an award-winning author who has written extensively on Ajax and JavaScript. With over 100 titles published, he's sold over a million copies of his books and been translated into 16 languages. As a former faculty member of MIT and Cornell, he teaches corporate seminars around the country.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Great beginning, bad ending
Great beginning, bad ending, August 9, 2004

By 

Jack D. Herrington "engineer and author" (Silicon Valley, CA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Eclipse Cookbook (Paperback)

Like the other O'Reilly book on Eclipse this book starts great, but then ends up off topic. In this case the first eight chapters cover basic Eclipse use from installation, through creating Java projects, refactorting code, and integrating with ANT. The book then turns sharply into basic Java project implementation, which is better covered in any number of Java books. This goes on from chapters eight through twelve, and only comes back to Eclipse specific in the last two chapters which cover writing plugins.

This is better than the other O'Reilly book, but I would have liked it to have stayed on course and to cover some of the more standard plugins that are being used in the wild. Great beginning, bad ending. I would recommend this as an introduction to Eclipse for anyone unfamiliar with IDEs, but this recommendation comes with the aforementioned reservations.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Helpful "cookbook", July 10, 2004

By 

Eric Wuehler (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Eclipse Cookbook (Paperback)

If you are looking at using Eclipse for Java development, this book might help. I'd say this would be beneficial to those who are notch above beginner to intermediate Eclipse users. If you are a brand new Eclipse user you might find "Eclipse" by the same author more helpful. There is a bit of overlap between the two books - the author makes references to his "Eclipse" book in several of the Eclipse Cookbook recipes.

If you're already comfortable with Eclipse and are moving into SWT programming, there are a few chapters I found helpful in this area. Plenty of code samples to get started with SWT - which is why I'm keeping the book. I also liked the information on CVS and Ant.

However, I did feel like the book was a little thin on details at time - I think there could have been a bit more than the 175 "recipes" contained in the book. For example, I would have liked to see a section on getting Eclipse loaded and running on different platforms.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars too much padding, January 12, 2005

By 

Kenneth A. Ashin "Ken Ashin" (Auburndale, MA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Eclipse Cookbook (Paperback)

The book has some useful information, but does not
go beyond the very basic. In light of this, it is
annoying that so much space is taken up with repeated
samples of the same code, and with more screen shots
than are needed. I've encountered this before in one
of Mr. Holzner's books (XML Complete), and I have to
wonder if this is done to pad the book to a length
that justifies the cost.