Customer Reviews

Java Rules

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For the Java generalist who is serious about knowing the details of the language, I'd say there are three books that stand out from the crowd: to learn Java, read The Java Programming Language, by Gosling, et al; to thoroughly understand every nuance of the lanaguage, read The Java Language Specification, available at the Java website or in printed form; and while you're somewhere between learning and mastering the language, read Java Rules.

Java Rules methodically steps you through every aspect of the core language, referring to the specification here, a comment from Bloch or some other Java luminary there. If you're looking for an introdution to Java, this book is not for you. If you've been writing Java code for awhile and ask questions like, "I wonder how the floating point types *really* work?", then this book is absolutely for you.

In addition to the core language and a few fundamental types like String and Date, the author does go into a good deal of detail when discussing the collections framework, and his treatment of the subject is as good as any I've seen.

I hope this book catches on, it certainly deserves to.

Volume 2 is now available as a free download at http://www.javarules.com

The author has taken the Java Language Specification and other sources and organized, expanded on, and refined them in a such a way that it becomes a much easier task for any Java programmer to learn about all the nitty gritty details of Java. This is without a doubt the best book I've seen on explaining the intricacies of Java. It is obvious that the author has spent a great deal of time and effort to produce a book as well written this one. Highly recommended to anyone seriously interested in learning Java at a deeper level.

This book is a treasure. If you want to really become seriously familiar with Java details, then get this book!

Great book! The level of detail is fantastic. The only complaint I have is the scope. The cover mentions other "volumes" but there is nothing about their availability either in the book or on the Addison-Wesley site.