Customer Reviews

Java Phrasebook

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4 star:		(1)
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This is a very odd approach for a Java reference book. The idea is that, if you are in a foreign country and cannot speak the language, "phrasebooks" for that language, showing you how to say common phrases without having to study the language in detail, are very helpful. That is true. However, those people who find such phrasebooks useful tend to board a plane and go home in a few weeks, with no real further use for the language. The problem is, how many times is that true in programming? Either you need to know the entire programming language, or you don't. This book is an attempt to use the same phrasebook approach for Java. In the beginning, it does a pretty good job of stating basic things you need to know such as setting up your environment, compiling from the command line, etc. that are usually not clearly stated in books that teach you the full-blown language. However, don't expect it to teach you the language. It might make a good reference for showing novices certain basics and maybe even experienced programmers might find it useful for a few useful "recipes" and tricks, but I found The Java Cookbook much more helpful and comprehensive in its coverage. The book's biggest weakness is it skips over the specific issue of object-orientation in Java. The following is the table of contents:

Chapter 1. The Basics
Compiling a Java Program; Running a Java Program;
Setting the Classpath;

Chapter 2. Interacting with the Environment
Getting Environment Variables; Setting and Getting System Properties; Parsing Command-Line Arguments;

Chapter 3. Manipulating Strings
Comparing Strings; Searching For and Retrieving Substrings;Processing a String One Character at a Time; Reversing a String by Character;Reversing a String by Word; Making a String All Uppercase or All Lowercase; Trimming Spaces from the Beginning or End of a String; Parsing a Comma-Separated String;

Chapter 4. Working with Data Structures
Resizing an Array ;Iterating Over a Collection; Creating a Mapped Collection; Sorting a Collection; Finding an Object in a Collection; Converting a Collection to an Array;

Chapter 5. Dates and Times
Finding Today's Date; Converting Between Date and Calendar Objects; Printing Date/Time in a Given Format; Parsing Strings into Dates; Adding to or Subtracting from a Date or Calendar; Calculating the Difference Between Two Dates; Comparing Dates; Finding the Day of Week/Month/Year or Week Number; Calculating Elapsed Time;

Chapter 6. Pattern Matching with Regular Expressions
Regular Expressions in Java; Finding Matching Text Using a Regular Expression; Replacing Matched Text; Finding All Occurrences of a Pattern; Printing Lines Containing a Pattern; Matching Newlines in Text;

Chapter 7. Numbers
Checking Whether a String Is a Valid Number; Comparing Floating Point Numbers; Rounding Floating Point Numbers; Formatting Numbers; Formatting Currencies; Converting an Integer to Binary, Octal, and Hexadecimal;
Generating Random Numbers; Calculating Trigonometric Functions; Calculating a Logarithm;

Chapter 8. Input and Output
Reading Text from Standard Input; Writing to Standard Output; Formatting Output; Opening a File by Name; Reading a File into a Byte Array; Reading Binary Data; Seeking in a File; Reading a JAR or Zip Archive; Creating a Zip Archive;

Chapter 9. Working with Directories and Files
Creating a File; Renaming a File or Directory; Deleting a File or Directory; Changing File Attributes; Getting the Size of a File; Determining if a File or Directory Exists; Moving a File or Directory; Getting an Absolute Filename Path from a Relative Filename Path; Determining if a Filename Path is a File or Directory; Listing a Directory; Creating a New Directory;

Chapter 10. Network Clients
Contacting a Server; Finding IP Addresses and Domain Names; Handling Network Errors; Reading Text; Writing Text; Reading Binary Data; Writing Binary Data; Reading Serialized Data; Writing Serialized Data; Reading a Web Page via HTTP;

Chapter 11. Network Servers
Creating a Server and Accepting a Request; Returning a Response; Returning an Object; Handling Multiple Clients; Serving HTTP Content;

Chapter 12. Sending and Receiving Email
Overview of JavaMail API; Sending Email Sending MIME Email; Reading Email

Chapter 13. Database Access
Connecting to a Database via JDBC; Sending a Query via JDBC; Using a Prepared Statement; Retrieving Results of a Query; Using a Stored Procedure;

Chapter 14. Using XML
Parsing XML with SAX; Parsing XML with DOM; Using a DTD to Verify an XML Document; Creating an XML Document with DOM; Transforming XML with XSLT;

Chapter 15. Using Threads;
Starting a Thread; Stopping a Thread;Waiting For a Thread to Complete; Synchronizing Threads; Pausing a Thread; Listing All Threads;

Chapter 16. Dynamic Programming Through Reflection
Getting a Class Object; Getting a Class Name; Discovering Class Modifiers; Finding Superclasses; Determining the Interfaces Implemented by a Class; Discovering Class Fields;Discovering Class Constructors; Discovering Method Information; Getting Field Values; Setting Field Values; Invoking Methods; Loading and Instantiating a Class Dynamically;

Chapter 17. Packaging and Documenting Classes
Creating a Package; Documenting Classes with JavaDoc; Archiving Classes with Jar; Running a Program from a JAR File;

Java Phrasebook is a beautiful, well written book containing 100's of phrases which will help the reader to accomplish common tasks in Java. This book is for intermediate Java developers as well as developers who are new to Java.
The author assumes you have previous knowledge of Java and you are ready to program in Java; don't worry he has included references to various web sites (mostly Sun) throughout the book for additional information you might need.

The book covers JDK 5.0 and is not a Java language tutorial or introduction or even a reference to the Java language.

Personally, I found this book very easy to read, and carry; it fits in my purse. I do agree with what the author suggests; if your goal is to get a deeper understanding of a specific technology, this is not the book you are looking for.
On the other hand, this book should be very helpful for those who need to brush up some phrases before an Interview or even to those who teach Java courses.
I had seen foreign language phrase books earlier, this was the first technical phrasebook I read, and if you are indeed looking for one, I highly recommend this for Java.

When I bought this book I was beginning Java, now I am reasonably proficient. I rarely consulted this book in this journey.

Whenever I wanted to know something simple, this book was no help.

This book is OK, but I can't quite see where it useful. It wasn't useful for me as an amateur beginner as I gravitated towards the net or fully fledged Java books, and I very much doubt it would be useful for seasoned programmers.