Java 2 Certification All-in-One Exam Guide, 3rd Edition [Hardcover]

William R. Stanek (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 25, 2001 | Series: All-In-One Certification

This text provides complete coverage of both the developer and programmer exams for Java 2 certification. There are more than 500 sample questions and exercises included in the book/CD package test, for comprehension and to prepare readers for the Sun exams. Exam tips highlight actual exam topics and an easy-to-use map of exam objectives facilitates quick access for exam review. Technical discussion sidebars offer in-depth understanding, while drawings and photos enhance the learning experience.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

If you have familiarity with Java or an object-oriented program language like C++, the All-in-One Java 2 Exam Guide does a competent (if not exceptional) job of explaining the individual components, features, and functions of Java--but if you're weak on concepts, you'll definitely need another book to back this up.

The organization of the book is fairly simple, starting off with the absolute basics of programming, moving on to slightly more advanced topics like switch and case statements, then walking the reader through most of Java's functions, arguments, interfaces, and exception handling on a case-by-case basis. The book's explanations are fairly minimal, explaining each function quickly with relevant snippets of code, which demonstrate either a function or how to do some commonly requested task (these are sparsely documented, however).

Programmers will nod sagely, appreciating the no-nonsense way the book rips through a large amount of data in short order, and if you know what you're doing you can very quickly get a lot of information. The code segments are clear and concise, and generally are useful for illuminating the proper way to use a function or structure something--and there is an awful lot of hands-on code to play around with here. Unfortunately, if there's a snippet of code that you don't quite understand, you may be left up the creek--or have to tinker with the code yourself to see how it works. And the code isn't linked together to form a single program at the end of each chapter, as in some books that try to explain programming. If you're used to programming with a goal in mind rather than just programming for the sake of experimentation, you could have some troubles here.

People fuzzy on the more conceptual portions of Java may be left behind, too, as the book's strong point is going through what Java does, not why it does it. If you're weak on why inheritance is such a valuable thing to use... well, then you probably shouldn't be coding in Java anyway. But if you don't quite understand the concept of thread synchronization and why a programmer would be concerned with it, the Java 2 Exam Guide goes over it in a single page. The writing, when it comes to explaining concepts, is clunky--it will tell you what Java does to handle threading, but not really explain why.

Another slight problem with the book is its lack of test focus. It goes through Java in a fair amount of detail, but doesn't really explain what's likely to be on the test and what isn't. As stated, there's a lot of information packed into these pages, and it comes very quickly. It would be nice to know what are the questions that almost invariably arise on the exam, common mistakes that programmers have, etc. This is more of a reference book than a tutorial, so slimming down the reader's choices would have been helpful.

Each chapter contains exercises and a set of questions. The exercises, again, are good in the hands of a programmer who knows what they're doing--generally, a goal is given in an exercise ("Write a program that writes your phone number to a file as an int with a seven-digit number"), with a sample program given at the end of the chapter. But again, the exercise's "answer" is just a code segment, so hopefully you'll either understand how it works or be able to fool with it and deconstruct why it did. The questions are multiple choice and are fairly tough, but not backbreaking.

In short, this is a book that is slanted far more toward reference than to test-taking or tutorial. As such, it's useful for those who already understand Java to a large extent and are looking to lock down their knowledge before they actually spend the money on the test, and experienced programmers will appreciate the brevity involved. Those with less savvy, however, may wish to find another book to go with. Recommended for the experienced. --William Steinmetz

From the Back Cover

Prepare to pass both the programmer's and developer's certification exams

Now you can prepare for the two widely taken Java 2 exams--the programmer's and developer's exams--using this single comprehensive volume. This reference will map out all objectives for both exams and provide you with Java programming essentials. Each chapter contains numerous practice questions, illustrations, and test-taking tips, making it a premier study tool. And, it's packed with helpful sidebars offering in-depth technical discussions of concepts and techniques you've just read about.

Get complete details on exam topics, including how to:

• Apply programming fundamentals
• Design application interfaces
• Utilize graphics, components, and layout managers
• Use objects, constructors, and classes
• Find out about inheritance, multithreading, and string handling
• Access and manage databases
• Identify when an object is eligible for garbage collection
• Work with control statements, data types, and variables

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 800 pages
• Publisher: Osborne/McGraw-Hill; 3rd edition (September 25, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0072191694
• ISBN-13: 978-0072191691
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.6 x 2.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,632,917 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

William has over 20 years of hands-on experience with advanced programming and development. He is a leading technology expert, an award-winning author, and a pretty-darn-good instructional trainer. Over the years, his practical advice has helped millions of programmers, developers, and network engineers all over the world. He has written more than 100 books. Find William on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/WilliamStanekAuthor.

William has been involved in the commercial Internet community since 1991. His core business and technology experience comes from over 11 years of military service. He has substantial experience in developing server technology, encryption, and Internet solutions. He has written many technical white papers and training courses on a wide variety of topics. He frequently serves as a subject matter expert and consultant.

William has an MS with distinction in information systems and a BS in computer science, magna cum laude. He is proud to have served in the Persian Gulf War as a combat crewmember on an electronic warfare aircraft. He flew on numerous combat missions into Iraq and was awarded nine medals for his wartime service, including one of the United States of America's highest flying honors, the Air Force Distinguished Flying Cross. Currently, he resides in the Pacific Northwest with his wife and children.

William recently rediscovered his love of the great outdoors. When he's not writing, teaching, or making presentations, he can be found hiking, biking, backpacking, traveling, or trekking in search of adventure.

Follow William on Twitter at http://twitter.com/WilliamStanek. William also writes as Robert Stanek. To learn more about Ruin Mist, Magic Lands, Bugville Critters, visit http://www.bugvillecritters.com/.

William R. Stanek (www.williamstanek.com) lived in Japan from 1985 to 1989. He traveled extensively and made many friends. While living in Japan, he spent much of his free time in Aomori (青森), Hachinohe (八戸), Misawa (三沢), and Tokyo (東京). He misses the wonderful food and drink and the good friends he made. He says, "On break, I traveled all over. On the island of Hokkaidô in Sapporo they have these wonderful Ice Festivals. My favorite thing about spring was the Cherry Blossom Festival. I'd take day trips to Aomori (青森) and Hachinohe (八戸) all the time. While in Japan, I studied kendo, the Japanese language, and Buddhism."

William lived in Europe from 1989 to 1991. During that time, he lived in Germany (mostly) and had several extended stays in the UK and Scotland including deployments to Mildenhall, UK. He spent his time in the UK travelling, and especially enjoyed his visits to Cambridge and London. He's been a football (soccer) fan since he was old enough to kick a ball and especially enjoyed being in Kaiserslautern for the championships. He misses the wonderful food and drink and the good friends he made. He says, "There's nothing like Fridays at the pub or Saturday market."

William lived in Hawaii from 1991 to 1996. During that time, he worked shift-work at Kunia Field Station, attended Hawaii Pacific University and University of Hawaii, and spent a lot of time at the beach. He and his wife's first child was born in Hawaii. William's writing career began in Hawaii when his first book, Electronic Publishing Unleashed, was published in 1995. The runaway success of that book and it's sequel, Web Publishing Unleashed, helped establish him as a leader and innovator in technical writing.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good, accurate, detailed, November 7, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Java 2 Certification All-in-One Exam Guide, 3rd Edition (Hardcover)

Mr. Stanek has created a very good Java certification guide that is well-organized and very detailed. As a Java programmer with 3 yars experience, I found that the book was very good at helping me remember things I may have forgotten and also sufficiently detailed that someone with less experience would have an easy time using the book to get certification.

My favorite part of the book are the extensive Q&A/exam reviews. The book must have over 1,000 practice questions and exercises. This is much more than I've found in any other book and this is wonderful! Because I've been programming for a while, I went straight to the practice exams (the book has 5!; 3 programmer; 2 developer). I took the first practice test and failed miserably. I am now going through the text chapter by chapter and looking forward to taking the next practice exam.

If you are looking for a Java certification book or even a book to learn more about Java programming, I think this is the one. I recommend.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Good conception, careless execution, January 26, 2002

By 

WellRead "mark100" (Gainesville, FL United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Java 2 Certification All-in-One Exam Guide, 3rd Edition (Hardcover)

This book as too many errors. I am not just talking about typos (of which there are many), I am talking about substantive errors that can cause confusion and failure for someone not catching them.

Examples:

Page 171: It says that the static keyword prevents a subclass from modifying a method.

--Obviously the author confuses the fundamental purpose of the 'final' and 'static' keywords.

Page 176: "A variable cannot be changed by a subclass if it has been declared static and final."

Whoever wrote this is quite confused. First of all, if a variable has been declared final then it cannot be changed (once initialized) by ANY method, in the same class, in a subclass or wherever. Second, as indicated above, the static keyword has nothing to do with whether a variable can be modified.

These are not minor points but if these were the only errors it wouldn't be that bad, but there are lots more like this.

It would also be not as bad if the author was available and could at least publish an errata and promise to fix the errors in the next (the fourth) edition. But there is no email contact given and no errata.

The "reviewer" should have caught the errors also. The acknowledgement says he "invites contact". So I contacted him to simply ask who I can contact about the errors in the book and the email was not even acknowledged.

It has three practice exams and four on the CD, which sounds like a lot. But the exams on the CD are the same questions as in the book. There are plenty of free, good exams available on the web, so the CD should not be a factor anyway.

I gave the book two stars only because it provides a healthy
amount of exercises, with solutions (with a lot of errors, nevertheless), in addition to the practice exams. But for the price it doesn't deliver.

Bill Brogden's exam cram is cheaper and a better choice.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very Good book, could be better, software not so good, January 23, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Java 2 Certification All-in-One Exam Guide, 3rd Edition (Hardcover)

I thought the book was well done. It was very helpful and very easy to read and understand the material. It took me less than 2 weeks to read the chapters and finish all the practice questions for the Java 2 Programmer Certification. It does cover all the topics in the exam. I passed the certification exam on my first try and I don't have real world development experience yet. Just reading the book isn't enough though because the exam has very tricky questions. This was the only Certification book for Java that I bought to study with and I believe I made the right choice. This book was a great review for me and help me strengthen the areas I was weak in. There are a few typos in the book but they are pretty easy to figure out.

The CD needs help. Many errors. After taking the practice exams twice you already memorize the answers so it is no longer helpful. I suggest using other sources for practicetests but be careful because practice test questions if you don't verify if their answers are correct and why they are correct, could make you make mistakes on the real exam or jumble up the java knowledge you already have.