Struts 2 Design and Programming: A Tutorial (A Tutorial series) (Paperback)

~ Budi Kurniawan (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Offering both theoretical explanations and real-world applications, this in-depth guide covers the 2.0 version of Struts, revealing how to design, build, and improve Java-based Web applications within the Struts development framework. Feature functionality is explained in detail to help programmers choose the most appropriate feature to accomplish their objectives, while other chapters are devoted to file uploading, paging, and object caching.

About the Author

Budi Kurniawan is known for his clear writing style. A consultant at Brainy Software Corp., he has written software licensed by Fortune 100 companies and architected and developed large scale applications for various organizations around the world. He has also published more than 100 articles in prestigious publications. His other books include How Tomcat Works, Java 6 New Features, and Java for the Web with Servlets, JSP, and EJB.

Product Details

• Paperback: 576 pages
• Publisher: BrainySoftware; 2nd edition (January 25, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0980331609
• ISBN-13: 978-0980331608
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #106,899 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is the one to buy, February 17, 2008

By	Marc Peabody "JavaRanch Bartender" (Columbus, OH USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I'm convinced this is and will remain the authoritative book on Struts 2. I know that more are being written but I don't care. You will not find one better.

I've never worked with Struts 2 in the past yet I was able to get a pretty solid understanding of it in a very short amount of time. Granted, I've had plenty of experience with the original Struts, JSF, and other web technologies, but I think even a beginner could pick this up fairly easily.

I let a friend of mine who had used Struts 2 on a project before skim through my copy of Struts 2 Design and Programming to check for any gaping holes or errant information before writing this review. It passed his inspection. (Thanks, Eric!)

I initially was a little skeptical when I saw that this Struts 2 book includes many other topics like DAOs, Velocity, FreeMarker, Dojo, and JFreeChart. These sections actually turned out quite pleasant to read and were great introductions to those topics without taking anything away from the main topic: Struts 2.

When you start making your way into chapters 5 and 6, feel free to jump around to other chapters. Chapters 5 and 6 cover the many tags in Struts 2 and, even with the author's great explanations and examples, can become a little tiresome for a cover-to-cover kind of read (but makes for a terrific reference). I suggest coming back to these chapters every once in a while to chew off two or three of the tags at a time. I expect this tip will add to your reading enjoyment.

Overall, this is a terrific book and I highly recommend it to anyone working with or curious about Struts 2.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars It's ALL meat..., April 29, 2008

By	J. Brutto "~ RevOf11" (Macungie, PA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is definitely not for a "casual read". What you'll find here is information written as if it were the design documentation for the Struts 2 project. EXTREMELY detailed, this will most likely be your troubleshooting guide and information resource whenever you work with or get stuck somewhere in the framework.

The author goes with a "no fluff" approach to the book and the 500+ pages are nothing but details, details, details (aka, meat). There's plenty in the book that you probably won't need/use more than once or twice; but when you do, you'll be glad to have this reference for the general lookup and troubleshooting the intricacies and details of Struts (I haven't had it long and I already found pieces that are contained within that are just blatantly missing from other texts).

The book really exposes Struts 2 and its inner workings. You will need to take what is there and completely rework it for you application (it's not a "copy-and-paste-from-me" book), but you will understand thoroughly what is happening under the covers.

This is also the first book I've read so far that covers the "default, no-config" option available in Struts 2. It's finally nice to have a reference that goes over the default information so that you aren't declaring everything explicitly until it works the way you want it to. You can just check this book out and figure out which parameters, constants, etc. you need to override/alter.

It's a heavy "general" read, but it's a wonderful, light reference.

The only reason I can't give it 5 stars is due to the overall formatting. The sections of the text are separated as if it were being displayed on a basic web page, wiki, etc. It just made narrowing down what's on the page to your specific needs a little harder than usual.

PS - don't let it's size fool you, it really is COMPLETELY packed

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Requires a bit of effort but there's a wealth of information in there, May 18, 2008

By	U. Namgyel (Jersey City, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The book is for people who have a solid understanding of the servlet/JSP api. Some of the examples in the book require a little extra work on your part since the it does not layout every step. However if you do put the effort and go over the chapters thoroughly, you'll find that there's a wealth of information in here.