Good Java Books for Beginners?

nobody69 asks: "During the spring I took a C++ class at the local junior college and, frankly, the textbook sucked. However, I remembered hearing Good Things about 'Practical C++ Programming' on /., so I picked it up and found it to be a great resource, especially since it was about half the price of the text. But I'm starting Java soon, so I was wondering if there was any Java equivalent - something with lots of short, to-the-point examples and good explanations. 'Practical C++ Programming' also had some exercises at the end of each chapter, whicch would be nice, but aren't necessary."

Comments

ORA to the rescue

[babbage]

I was going to make some snide remark along the lines of "the best book for someone wanting to learn Java would be a Python manual!", but this is a pretty slow thread so constructive criticism would probably be more welcome. Oh well. :)

I really liked the previous editions of O'Reilly's Java in a Nutshell and Java Examples in a Nutshell. My job doesn't involve Java (thank the gods! :), so I haven't had much use for them, but still they sit on my bookshelf, and my co-workers that do program in Java have either borrowed both of them repeatedly or have copies of their own. (The same author, David Flanagan, is also the author of a couple of O'Reilly's JavaScript books, but that's not what you're looking for here.)

(Ok sorry I can't resist -- my favorite lame Java bashing line: "Java has all the graceful simplicity of a systems language like C with the incredible performance of a scripting language like Python. That is to say, it's ugly as hell & slow as shit." Personally, I say if you're better off going with ugly but fast, like C, or pretty but slow, like Python. Java is the worst of all worlds, remarkable mainly for the dexterity with which Sun's marketing department has shoved this terrible language down our collective throats.)

But, like I say, I'm trying to be constructive here :). Less sarcastically, the Nutshell books are great, both as a learning tool and as a refernce later, after you're comfortable with the language. The same applies with other books in the series too.

What I did

[selectspec]

Anyone who knows me (all 2 of them) would tell you that I am a book freak. I love tech books, and I learned everything I know about engineering pretty much from books alone. Especially with C and C++. There are so many great books on C and C++, I could recommend a wonderful list.

However, Java is a different deal all together. First of all, if you are familiar with C++ you now about 90% of Java right of the bat. So you don't really need a "from scratch" Java book. All you really need is reference material, and some basic guides on how key things work in the JVM, like threading, synchronization, etc.

My recommendation is the web on this one. Download the latest JDK (1.3 or 1.4). That is full of great references, API's, HOWTO's and guides. This will be the source of 95% of your Java knowledge.

Next, I'd start checking out C/C++ User's Journal's Java Solutions. You can subscribe to the magazine, but frankly I'd stick to the online version. These guys are C++ freaks who talk about java from the C++ perspective, so you will feel at home with the discussions there.

The only books that I would recommend, are for specific applications. For GUI work, get O'Reilly's Java Swing, and Topley's Core Swing Advanced Programming. Either one will do; they are both excellent. For Serlvet's, O'Reilly's Java Servlets is OK, but slightly out of date (maybe mine is and they have updated). Also, Professional JSP by Wrox is excellent for both serlvet and JSP work (even touches on EJB).

What is interesting for me about Java, is that I find myself using online resources much more than I ever do with C/C++ applications. Java documentation is so standardized (javadoc) that it lends well to this approach.