Java How to Program (6th Edition) (How to Program (Deitel)) [Paperback]

Harvey & Paul) Deitel & Deitel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 14, 2004 | ISBN-10: 0131483986 | ISBN-13: 978-0131483989 | Edition: 6

The Deitels' groundbreaking How to Program series offers unparalleled breadth and depth of programming concepts and intermediate-level topics for further study. The books in this series feature hundreds of complete, working programs with thousands of lines of code. This edition is completely up-to-date with The Java 2 Platform Standard Edition (J2SE) 1.5. Now includes topics such as autoboxing, enumerations, enhanced for loops, static import statements, variable-length argument lists, and much more. Presents each new concept in the context of a complete, working program, immediately followed by one or more windows showing the program's input/output dialog. Enhances the Live-Code Approach with syntax coloring. Provides Helpful Programming Tips, all marked by icons: Good Programming Practices, Common Programming Errors, Error-Prevention Tips, Performance Tips, Portability Tips, Software Engineering Observations, Look and Feel Observations. Includes CD-ROM with every book that contains Java^TM 2 Platform, Standard Edition 1.5, Netbeans, Apache Tomcat, JCreator LE version, jEdit, jGRASP, BlueJ, MySQL, source code for all the book's examples, and Hyperlinks to valuable Java demos and Internet resources. A valuable reference for programmers and anyone interested in learning the Java programming language. 

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Dr. Harvey Deitel is one of the world's leading computer science instructors and seminar presenters, and author of more than a dozen books. He worked on the pioneering operating system teams in industry and academia that developed many of the techniques at the heart of operating systems like UNIX®, Windows NT™ and OS/2™.

Paul Deitel has taught Visual Basic, Java, C and C++ at numerous hardware and software companies, including Sun Microsystems, Digital Equipment Corporation, IBM, Open Environment Corporation, Adra Systems, and Cambridge Technology Partners, and is himself an expert developer.

The Deitels are principals of Deitel & Associates, Inc., an international training organization specializing in Visual Basic, Java, C and C++, and object technologies.

Product Details

• Paperback: 1568 pages
• Publisher: Prentice Hall; 6 edition (August 14, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0131483986
• ISBN-13: 978-0131483989
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (49 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #277,784 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

63 of 69 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You get what you pay for..., October 6, 2004

By 

Bosco "Java Programmer" (New York City) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Java How to Program (6th Edition) (How to Program (Deitel)) (Paperback)

I think I have bought just about every 'learning Java' book out there, with limited exuberunce, until this book. The advantage this text has over others is to successfully 'weave' the learning of Java as the chapters progress. Other texts do accomplish this to some extent, but I've never seen this achieved to this degree of balance. This book is a heads down, hands on learning device.

Many books provide a single example that gets more and more complex as the chapters, and (hopefully) your skills, progress. Deitel certainly does this (via an Elevator simulation), but also accomplishes this on many different levels with plenty of smaller programs. Each example is explained *line by line* without exception. Additionally, you are provided with example program output right on the page.

I've noticed many 'learning Java' books show you code snippets and little output if any (e.g. Eckel's book, which I love for other reasons), leaving it up to your imagination to put it all together in the context of a complete program.

This text appears to be prepared for the classroom, from its thorough content (25 chapters, 7 appendices, 1400+ pages, cdrom) and available lab and instructor companion books. There is a nice, effective use of color without being distractive like some other texts I've seen.

The negatives are the length, cost and (ouch) the weight. It is one of the heavier books in my collection, for sure!

To summarize, if you are a C programmer looking to quickly jump into Java, or perhaps a genius with a photographic memory, this may not be your first purchase. If you are a newbie, have limited experience with Java, or have been disappointed with other texts, I think you may find this to be the most complete book out there.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars I hate this book, August 22, 2006

By 

rob (somewhere in the south) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Java How to Program (6th Edition) (How to Program (Deitel)) (Paperback)

I am a programming newb with a geek streak a lifetime wide. I took a Java class this summer hoping to begin groking the one final frontier of computing that has always eluded me. We used this as the text. As somebody who teaches postsecondary courses in an entirely separate field, I feel this book is not a good first choice for an instructor in comp sci, especially for courses for nonmajors or beginners. The prose is exceedingly dry and longwinded *without real purpose*, and tests even my attention span... which is ordinarily sufficient for a continuous performance of the Ring Cycle. What really hacked me off is the way that the book handles terminology and syntax-- from the very beginning, the code examples often use parallel terms within the code in a way that makes it utterly unclear to the newbie whether they're staring down the barrel of a method name, a parameter/argument, what-have-you, which makes it very difficult to trace the logic of the code and get a good handle on the syntax. I have had far better luck grasping the concepts of Java and programming generally with Beginning Java for Dummies, believe it or not. I am a mature and educated adult actually INTERESTED in this topic and this book was absolutely dreadful to me-- instructors, please do not think you're going to choose this text for the present generation of undergrads and have it be anything but an utter waste of a hundred bucks for them.

18 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Overpriced and uninspiring, December 27, 2005

By 

calvinnme - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Java How to Program (6th Edition) (How to Program (Deitel)) (Paperback)

The Deitels approach the subject of learning to program in the Java language with all the joy of learning typewriter repair and maintenance. The book reads like a volume on appliance repair with tiny font and cookbook instructions. It is unfortunate that because of its title "How to Program" that instructors choose this thing as a textbook for their courses. If you have to use this book as a textbook for a class, the instructions will correctly tell you how to write programs, but you will get no feel for the language or its possibilities. In the end, this book will turn you into someone who programs by rote memory versus someone who programs with any insight into what you are doing. Might I suggest you supplement this book with the Core Java books by Horstmann and Cornell. Their books are far more readable and instructive, and might I add far cheaper. "Head First Java" is another excellent choice, especially for absolute beginners. I fear that some books by the Deitels, and this one in particular, remind me of an old saying "You might not get what you pay for but you will never get what you don't pay for." This book is an illustration of the first part of that old saying.