JSTL: Practical Guide for JSP Programmers (The Practical Guides) [Paperback]

Sue Spielman (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0126567557 | ISBN-13: 978-0126567557 | Publication Date: September 5, 2003 | Edition: 1

Web developers and page authors who use JavaServer Pages (JSP) know that it is much easier and efficient to implement web pages without reinventing the wheel each time. In order to shave valuable time from their development schedules, those who work with JSP have created, debugged, and used custom tags-a set of programmable actions that provide dynamic behavior to static pages-paving the way towards a more common, standard approach to using Java technology for web development. The biggest boost to this effort however has only recently arrived in the form of a standard set of tag libraries, known as the JSTL, which now provides a wide range of functionality and gives web page authors a much more simplified approach to implementing dynamic, Java-based web sites.

JSTL: Practical Guide for JSP Programmers is a timely resource for anyone interested in doing large-scale J2EE application development. It sticks to the main features of the JSTL so that developers don't have to sift through unnecessary details to begin using the tags and working with the expression language. Sue Spielman's straight-forward, practical approach is enhanced with numerous code samples and insightful descriptions to make learning the JSTL a quickly and easily accomplished task.

* Written by a best-selling author with a wealth of development experience and recognition in the Java community.
* Covers the core elements of the JSTL including the four standard tag libraries (core, internationalization/format, XML, and SQL) and expression language.
* Includes a reference section for all of the tabs and attributes contained in the JSTL.
* Via a companion web site, provides downloadable code for the code samples in the book.

Editorial Reviews

Review

An invaluable reference for any JSP developer's library. Sue makes the complicated seem simple with her conversational writing style and well thought out examples and analogies.
-Matt Houser, J2EE Developer with The Washington Post and former Sun Microsystems Java Instructor.

Book Description

A concise and focused guide to the new JSTL, a topic that any serious enterprise Java developer needs to know about.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 229 pages
• Publisher: Morgan Kaufmann; 1 edition (September 5, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0126567557
• ISBN-13: 978-0126567557
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #750,361 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not very helpful. Not recommended at all., March 11, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: JSTL: Practical Guide for JSP Programmers (The Practical Guides) (Paperback)

This book just wasn't very helpful. Not much depth, sparse, sporadic. Everytime I ran into a JSTL issue/question on my project I ran to this book hoping that maybe this time it would provide answers. It never did. Very disappointing and frustrating. Look somewhere else.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Shallow, February 7, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: JSTL: Practical Guide for JSP Programmers (The Practical Guides) (Paperback)

This book is potentially promising.
Short, concise, inexpensive. Can it be possible?
Not really.
The author skirts the major issues of getting started, forwarding readers to the 'easy installation instructions' on the Jakarta site, on all matters trivial and not so trivial.
The content itself is mediocre at best, written offhand and leaves you reading and re-reading every section to check whether you missed something when there really was very little there to begin with.
This book smells of a rush-to-publish and under-editting and under-testing. Steer clear.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Get started with JSTL rapidly, September 27, 2003

By 

Bass Player "bassplayer4ever" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: JSTL: Practical Guide for JSP Programmers (The Practical Guides) (Paperback)

This might be one of the most effective IT book I have ever read. It's short but comprehensive. All four libraries are covered and covered quite well.

The first few chapters provide an introduction to JSTL, including the reasons and a few brief examples. The chapter on the EL seemed to be the weakest chapter, but it was detailed enough to get a solid start with using it.

Each library has a pretty good sized chapter with coverage of all of the tags and their most common attributes. The code samples covered what you are most likely to do with the tags, although I would have like to see some uncommon uses as well. The chapter on the SQL tags, the most controversial library, included her opinions on why you would use them.

Overall, this book provides a quick source of information for learning JSTL. It will also make a great reference to have when you are writing your JSP pages.