Java in 60 Minutes A Day [Paperback]

R. F. Raposa (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 30, 2003 | ISBN-10: 0471423149 | ISBN-13: 978-0471423140 | Edition: 1

• Shows readers how to use Java to harness the power of object-oriented programming
• Includes thirty one-hour lessons that recreate a typical week-long introductory seminar
• Focuses on the Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE)
• Helps readers to develop skills that are critical to many Web services scenarios
• The author was one of the first Sun Certified Instructors and has since taught Java to thousands of developers
• Companion Web site features an online presentation by the author that follows along with each chapter and includes an audio-only option for readers with dial-up Internet connection

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...it is one of those large language books...fortunately it is one of the better ones..." (CVu- The Journal of the ACCU, February 2004)

From the Back Cover

Get up and running with Java in no time using this innovative virtual classroom approach!

Do you know how to harness the exciting power of object-oriented programming? Focusing on the Java 2 Platform, Standard Edition (J2SE™), this revolutionary book and companion online presentation take you through 19 one-hour lessons that teach you how to use Java APIs, design a GUI program, and create applets in no time. You’ll quickly gain all the skills that are critical to any Java application!

• Explore Java fundamentals such as keywords, the built-in data types, strings, and references
• Learn how to think like an object-oriented programmer
• Write, compile, and execute a Java program using the J2SE Standard Developer Kit
• Progress through important Java concepts like exception handling, interfaces, collections, packages and the javadoc tool
• Develop your own fully functional Java GUI applications using Swing
• Perform database programming using JDBC and network programming using secure sockets and datagram packets
• Write multi-threaded Java applications
• Understand and develop software components following the JavaBeans specification

Join the author on the companion Web site in a training session. Follow along as he walks you through the online presentation for each chapter provided in streaming video or audio only. Source code is also available for download.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 800 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (May 30, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471423149
• ISBN-13: 978-0471423140
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.4 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,198,929 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

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Nice way to get started, August 26, 2007

By 

Kevin Benton "KB" (Chicago, IL United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Java in 60 Minutes A Day (Paperback)

Aug 2007 (see end for most recent updates)

I'm fairly pleased with what I've read so far in this book. I'm in the process of devouring it off my NetLibrary account and in the past five or so hours, I've sailed through the first five chapters. I can't comment on "significant" errors the previous reviewer posted, though I can say that some of the problems are really obvious. For example, in many cases where quotes (") were required, my copy shows double tick marks ('') instead. I'm not sure if this is a problem with NetLibrary or the text itself.

The examples given are all shown from a Windows command prompt (so far) and the author assumes the reader can use Notepad to enter code. I would prefer that the author takes time to move readers toward Eclipse IDE since it's free and can really help reduce the tedium of entering / debugging and running Java code, thus making it easier to learn and more fun to interact with. Granted - it takes a bit of effort to get Eclipse installed, but so did installing Java for the first time.

I've been writing software for the past twenty-five years and am just now starting to pick up Java (wish I had picked it up ten years ago now). The authors methods make me think beyond the printed text and do a good job of helping readers adapt from a procedural style of programming (identifying the steps to solving a problem) to a more object-oriented style (identifying unique classes of "stuff" and writing ways to make those classes interact).

As I said above, I haven't finished the book yet, and while I probably wouldn't have paid $50 for what I've gotten so far, it is clearly worth checking out. It got me interested enough to file a positive review here and I am acutally considering buying the book.

---

May 2008

I purchased this book a few months ago and found that my experience with the first five chapters has continued nicely up through chapter 12. While I haven't had as much time to devote to this book until very recently, I am pleased to report that I'm still finding that the quality level is about 4 / 5. When I peeked at chapter 18 - JDBC, it appears that one must have MS Access in order to use the examples. That frustrates me since I'm a Unix-based user and don't have MS Access. All-in-all, however, I'm glad I bought the book, though I have to admit, I was able to snag it used from Amazon for about $2 plus shipping. It's clearly worth that, but I'm still leaning more toward "Learning Java" (O'Reilly) for the more advanced concepts. I may just switch back over to "Learning Java" now that I've got the core concepts down (chapters 1-11).

By the way - the problem with quoting appears to be a NetLibrary issue, not one with the book.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ideal for beginners to intermediate, May 13, 2004

By 

Salman Hajipour (Tehran, Iran) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Java in 60 Minutes A Day (Paperback)

I've read this book twice, it has a great simple explanation on the Core Java and little more. I suggest it to whom they have a basic to intermediate level in Java, This is the one ! The best point to begin Java with. Also a great future is the online ready to download source files, It realy helps you when your confused to complete the Lab exercises.

At last I think if there was a CD-ROM included with the book involving the SDK and some bouns it was much more better.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Starts off great, but after that critical errors in book and examples ruin this book overall, September 6, 2005

By 

C. Johnson (Lawrenceville, GA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Java in 60 Minutes A Day (Paperback)

I bought this book, expecting to get a working knowledge of the JAVA programming language. Already being proficient in C++ and Visual Basic, I wanted to add another programming language to my skill set. For the most part this book did help accomplish my goal, but in the later chapters too many mistakes and laziness by the author ruined my overall view of this book.

The first few chapters in this book are very straighfoward and easy to follow, the author did a very good job in explaining JAVA concepts as well as providing examples putting those concepts to work. Each Chapter also has Labs at the end of the chapter in which you must use the concepts explained throughout the current chapter to complete. Because the chapters were written so well I was able to complete all the labs without even looking at the solutions.

However in the later chapters, I begin to discover that the author got very lazy. This is apparant when during quite a few chapters instead of listing the entire exmple programs in the book, he refers you to the website. Meaning if you are not by a computer or don't have internet access at all, then you will miss out on critical things that he does in the program. Additionaly, even if you are by a computer, just the fact that you have to stop reading just to download examples that should be listed in this book is very distracting. This makes the chapters very hard to follow and frustrating to say the least.

Also while errors were relatively few, there were some critical errors in the book, that if you don't pay close attention you will be VERY confused.

While I expect even the best books of this nature to have errors in the text, I find it unacceptable that the example programs and lab solutions available on the website have errors in them. I have found that even the authors example programs and lab solutions don't work because of errors. There is really no excuse for this at all. I mean were these programs even tested before they were put on the website? Apparantly not. One lab solution is just an exact copy of a lab for a previous chapter and does NOTHING that the Lab is asking for. I was able to figure out how to do it nonetheless, but it would have been nice to see how the author solved the problem. The current chapter I am in right now, I am completely stuck on Lab 17.4 and even the author's "solution" does not work so there is nothing I can do. I sent an email to the author requesting help, but I don't expect a response anytime this century.

I will just continue on so I can at least finish the book, but it seems that I will need to get another JAVA book to get a full understanding of the concepts that this book failed to explain properly due to mistakes.

I can't recommend this book for beginners, even if you have prior programming language experience you will find the later chapters very frustrating because of the problems I have mentioned above.

For $50 I would expect at least the author's solutions and examples to be correct, but they are not. In my opinion this is not $50 well spent.