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Test Driven: TDD and Acceptance TDD for Java Developers
Lasse Koskela
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Manning Publications
Published: 2007-10-12 |
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"Test Driven" is geared toward Java developers interested in writing better JUnit tests. Despite the title, it is useful
whether you want to write test first or test last.
The first part of the book covers the softer aspects of testing such as how to decide what tests to write first and spikes.
The rest of the book covers writing tests for common Java components including servlets, data access code and Swing. Examples
were for things that we frequently want to test. They included "hard" things such as testing times and threaded code.
I particularly liked the sections on design and testing patterns. There was good coverage of different JUnit extension libraries
with examples including dbunit, jmock, easymock, jemmy and abbot. There was also a full chapter on FIT.
I got a sense of "in the trenches" realism from the book. Tradeoffs of techniques were clearing mentioned. The chapter on
adopting TDD shows the experience of someone who has done it many times. The section on how to fight resistance really spoke
to me.
This is the first book I have read using JUnit 4, which was useful for reading well written tests. While there is an appendix
"tutorial" on JUnit 3.8 and 4.0 (two page annotated classes), you really should feel comfortable with one version of JUnit
before reading this book. While a few sections pertained to specific technologies, such as Spring, the concepts apply to
everyone. I highly recommend this book.
(Jeanne Boyarsky - Sheriff,
January 2008)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Working Effectively with Legacy Code
Michael Feathers
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Prentice Hall PTR
Published: 2004-10-02 |
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"Working Effectively with Legacy Code" is a very valuable resource. The author defines "legacy code" as "code without tests."
It doesn't matter whether the code was written last week or ten years ago. There is more emphasis on old code that nobody
understands, mainly because it is messier and harder to work with.
The examples in the book are mainly in C, C++ and Java, but there are a couple in C# and Ruby. While it is essential to
know one of these languages, the author provides enough information to understand the others. When a technique only applies
to a certain language, it is clearly indicated.
The author shows how different diagrams can help you learn how to understand code. In addition to UML, there are dependency
and effect sketches. The author uses these to show how to think about understanding and refactoring. Other tools, such as
refactoring browsers and mocks are explained.
Speaking of refactoring, there are "dependency breaking techniques" (aka refactorings) with step-by-step instructions (Martin
Fowler style) throughout the book. There are also explanations of why patterns and design rules exist. Most importantly,
there are lots and lots of cross-references and an excellent index.
Working with legacy code isn't fun, but this book helps make it as painless as possible. With the split emphasis between
psychological/understanding/techniques and refactoring, this book is both a great read and an excellent reference.
(Jeanne Boyarsky - Bartender,
November 2004)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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JUnit Recipes: Practical Methods for Programmer Testing
J.B.Rainsberger, Scott Stirling
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Manning Publications
Published: 2004-07-15 |
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J.B. recently replied jokingly, "buy them their own copies", to my mentioning that my team would be all over my copy of "JUnit
Recipes" like vultures if I was to leave it on the desk at work. I have to say that's not a bad idea. In fact, that's what
you should do if you're determined to make your development team learn how to write effective unit tests in those non-trivial
settings you inevitably encounter out there.
"JUnit Recipes" is, as its name implies, not a tutorial for writing JUnit tests although it does start small with some 50
pages of basic conventions and fundamentals of writing JUnit tests. Instead, it's a huge collection of little recipes for
tackling those everyday problems developers around the world encounter when trying to unit test their applications. Real world
solutions to real world problems. The book is divided into chapters by coarse-grained topics such as organizing test suites,
test data, XML, EJB's, JDBC, etc. all the way to testing web components and J2EE applications. The last hundred or so pages
of the book talk about some more exotic topics such as unit testing design patterns, using certain popular JUnit Extensions
such as GSBase and JUnit-Addons.
The recipe approach fits the domain perfectly. One doesn't need to reach 30 some pages of prose before "getting it", which
is the case with certain types of books discussing other problem domains. The recipes go straight to the meat of the subject
with concise and clear problem statements and then quickly proceed to show how to go about solving them. The formatting of
the provided code snippets is excellent as usual, with strong visual highlighting of important sections and careful indentation.
Joe has managed to put out something that I believe will be known as the unofficial JUnit bible for years to come. What are
you waiting for?
(Lasse Koskela - Bartender,
October 2004)
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Manning Publications
Published: 2004-07-15 |
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Sometimes the tiniest things are the most useful. Nails, screws, paperclips and post-its are all small, simple objects that
are used a thousand different ways. So it is with JUnit -- a small and really very simple testing tool that can find its way
into every corner of your Java development.
Rainsberger's book is a compendium of those thousand ways that JUnit can be used (well, OK, more like 130 ways). Each recipe
starts with a solid motivation and includes a worthwhile discussion afterwards. You quickly realize that the author is sharing
hard-won experience with you on every page. There are sections on testing standalone code of every description, as well as
detailed sections on testing servlets, EJBs, and other less tractable components.
I've been using JUnit for years, but I picked up quite a few useful tips from this enjoyable book. Highly recommended.
(Ernest Friedman-Hill - Sheriff,
September 2004)
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Manning Publications
Published: 2004-07-15 |
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"Wow!" on two accounts: 1. I'm actually giving a 10 horseshoe rating to a book, and 2. "JUnit Recipes" is a very thorough
and comprehensive encyclopedia of excellent advice and examples on almost every coding sitution I've ever wanted to test with
JUnit.
J. B. Rainsberger has compiled a 700 page collection of scores of excellent recipes written in pattern-like fashion, clearly
laying out testing problems in wont of solutions and the practical recipes for solving the problems, including annotated code
examples, step-by-step instructions, and plenty of quality explanations.
"JUnit Recipes" is destined to be a classic, and has earned a most prominent place on my bookshelf, as I'm certain I'll be
referencing it frequently for new and better ideas on formulating JUnit tests.
What's that? You'd like to borrow my copy of "JUnit Recipes?" No, get your own.
(Dirk Schreckmann - Sheriff,
August 2004)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Pragmatic Unit Testing in Java with JUnit
Andy Hunt, Dave Thomas
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The Pragmatic Programmers, LLC
Published: Sep 2003 |
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"Pragmatic Unit Testing", the second volume of "The Pragmatic Starter Kit", teaches the developer to code smartly by practicing
a regime of disciplined unit testing. Most books on this subject don't really go too far beyond how to write unit tests.
Where this book stands head and shoulders above the rest though, is the great depth the book goes into showing us exactly
what tests need to be written. Through a series of helpful mnemonics, the reader is taught exactly what to test, how to correctly
test boundary conditions, and what the properties of good tests are. We are also given general testing principles to keep
in mind, as well as questions to ask ourselves about our code while testing. The concepts given herein are invaluable, and
if the book ended with just this, it would be well worth the money.
The book doesn't stop there however. The authors offer excellent advice for integrating unit testing within the scope of
a project in a team environment, and we are given a look at how unit testing can influence design. Exercises are presented
to help the reader practice key concepts throughout the book.
This book is concise, weighing in at around 159 pages. The book is a very quick and pleasant read. It is appropriate for
the novice as well as the developer who's been around the block a couple of times. If you write unit tests, and particularly
if you are new to the game, this book is a cornucopia of wisdom. "Pragmatic Unit Testing" is to the practice of unit testing,
what Joshua Bloch's "Effective Java" is to the Java programming language. That's certainly high praise indeed.
Full version of this review is posted in the "Book reviews" forum.
(Jason Menard - Bartender,
January 2004)
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Buy this book
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StarOffice Suite Companion
Solveig Haugland and Floyd Jones
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Prentice Hall PTR
Published: 2002-09-24 |
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This book doesn't just tell you how StarOffice is supposed to work, it also tells you about some of its quirks and peculiarities.
It includes comments on the differences between StarOffice and OpenOffice and pointers to other useful resources, such as
websites with information on creating macros and additional templates that are available from the web. The book uses the
OpenOffice.org logo in the margin to indicate a tip specifically for that version of the program.
The tone of the book comes across as being created by people who like the program rather than a creation of a faceless corporation.
Here is an example of the text style from the section on macros from the last chapter of the book. "Macros can do things like
open a file when you do a particular task, process data, or buy your grandmothers' credit cards and buy $3000 worth of cat
toys.
The StarOffice suite has a huge amount of functionality and this book covers most of the functionality you are likely to
use. The book is in paperback and has a 40 page alphabetical index. It doesn't try to do it in a visual style with a screen
shot for every mouse click but via text instructions. I learnt a huge amount of new features despite having worked extensively
with StarOffice for over two years. I strongly recommend this book to anyone who intends to use StarOffice.
(Marcus Green - RanchHand,
February 2003)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Learning Wireless Java
by Qusay H. Mahmoud
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O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Published: 2001-12-15 |
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Learning Wireless Java is a small book, but the author uses the pages well. The book doesn't waste time trying to teach basic
java programming. It jumps right into the subject and doesn't look back.
The book is broken down into three sections. The first section introduces Java 2 Micro Edition. It gives you definitions
of basic terms and by page 10 you are working on your first program. The rest of the section gives you the detail on CLDC
and MIDP that you will need for the rest of the book.
Section two introduces you to programming with CLDC and MIDP. It starts with an introduction to the KToolbar and then each
other chapter introduces you to another area of wireless programming with Java 2 Micro Edition.
Section 3 has a quick reference to the APIs included with CLDC and MIDP. Normally I am not a fan of including API in a book
but I found myself referencing this one often.
(Matthew Phillips - Bartender,
February 2002)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Wireless Java Programming With J2ME
by Yu Feng , Dr. Jun Zhu
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Sams
Published: 2001-05-21 |
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J2ME. The next frontier of Java technology. The first book was written by Eric Gigure. It was only a reference for J2ME with
CLDC in mind as MIDP was under construction at that time. This book is written straight from the trenches. It is a great feast
for the coders who want to sully their hands with code.
The book is nicely structured in three parts. Part I talks about Wireless applicatons: how Java is getting into the wireless
area, what are the basics needed for J2ME programming, etc. In Chapter 4 , the authors have explained MIDP in detail.
Part II is the core of this book. The authors have covered everything on components of UI for wireless devices. Use of high
level and low Level API for application development is explained in detail with lots of code. The use of XML in the wireless
application chapter gives an idea of what is possible in the future. The data synchronizatiuon techniques and network programming
chapters show the real reach of J2ME. The biggest plus point of this book is the chapter on MOTOSHOP, the application for
which Yu Feng won the Motorola contest. The entire chapter is dedicated to the application.
In Part III, CLDC and MIDP class liabraries are given along with very, very good information about DOCOMO's I-mode which made
J2ME so popular.
This book is the icing on the cake after Eric's book. Developers who like to play with lots of code will love this piece. The book is for Intermediate to Advance
Developers.
(Shailesh Sonavadekar - Bartender,
August 2001)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Professional Java Mobile Programming
by Taylor, et all.
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Peer Information Inc.
Published: 2001-07 |
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"Java Mobile Programming" starts out strong with an in-depth view of J2ME technologies and protocols, explains how they are
related, and shows what each technology has to offer for the embedded and mobile device developer.
Advantages of a proper J2ME architecture and a very useful case study implementing the architecture is provided before plunging
into the core J2ME device configurations. Each of these sections provide a clear and concise explanation of each configuration
supported by self-documenting code examples. However, since "small" and "limited resources" are the name of the game, the
book gives reference and rightfully recommends the use of code obfuscators to help decrease the size of J2ME applications.
Equally impressive and pleasantly surprising were details of the current limitations of J2ME technologies. Suggestions on
how to avoid designs that may prove to limit a J2ME application are also included in this detailed book. I also appreciated
the chapter on how to convert applications to CDC and CLDC. This indicates that the authors wrote this book thinking about
real world scenarios.
The bottom line: This book gives a detailed and in-depth look at J2ME technologies, design, and architecture. It has useful
- real world case studies, sample code, and several working applications that teach the concepts. It explains how to use/interact
J2ME with JMS, J2EE, Servlets, Security, Synchronization, etc., and explanations of the pros, cons, and gottchas of each.
If this sounds like what you need, this book is for you.
(Matt Midcap - Sheriff,
July 2001)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Lucene in Action
Erik Hatcher, Otis Gospodneti
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Manning Publications
Published: 2004-12-01 |
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The Lucene library is a powerful text indexing and retrieval engine. While it's not a complete search solution, its multifaceted
API makes it easy to build one based on it. The examples shipping with it make it easy to get started with, but they only
show a small excerpt of what the library is capable of. Without a guide, it's easy to overlook important details and helpful
features.
That's where this book fits in. It devotes lengthy chapters to the two core activities of indexing and searching, and it offers
multiple examples of how the library accomplishes those. It also explains the multiple extension points that it API offers,
allowing a user to customize many aspects of its operation.
Further chapters discuss ports of Lucene to other languages, indexing rich document formats like Word, HTML, RTF and PDF,
introduce the Lucene Sandbox which collects a variety of user contributions, and case studies of some advanced and uncommon
usages.
The book is slightly outdated (it covers version 1.4, while 2.1 is released now), but with such a powerful API it's probably
better to start out by using not all of its features anyway. A small gripe of this reviewer is that some advanced features
are only hinted at, leaving the reader to piece the remainder together himself. But -- given the plentitude of material Lucene
offers -- that's probably unavoidable, and doesn't detract from a book that must be considered indispensable by serious users.
(Ulf Dittmer - Bartender,
May 2007)
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Manning Publications
Published: 2004-12-01 |
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The advent of the Internet has brought the humanity to a new era where information has become the keystone of many businesses
and human activities. The bad news is that the process of retrieving accurate information is often tedious and imprecise.
Undoubtedly, we are all information addicts. We need relevant information and we need it now. Many companies, such as Yahoo!,
Altavista, Google and some open-source movements, are striving to devise new algorithms and to create cutting edge tools whose
primary goal is to ease the pain of retrieving information needles in the Internet and desktop haystacks.
This book is 100% dedicated to the Lucene search engine library, which one of those free medications that can considerably
ease your pain of providing information retrieval support. The authors, who are both committers of the Lucene project, make
an outstanding job of presenting the library and describing how to incorporate it into your system in order to leverage its
flexible and powerful indexing and searching capabilities.
This book is the most comprehensive and up-to-date reference work on Lucene available on the bookshelves. It is targeted
at developers of any level in strong need of powerful indexing and information retrieval support that can be plugged into
the various lightweight and heavyweight systems they are developing. If you ever need to provide a search functionality to
your users, the best advice I can give you is to grab this book and learn how to leverage Lucene's potential.
(Valentin Crettaz - Sheriff,
March 2005)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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iText In Action - Creating and Manipulating PDF
Bruno Lowagie
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Manning Publications
Published: 2006-12-08 |
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The iText project is one of the -or maybe the- most popular Java library for creating PDF documents. This book, written by
one of the principal developers, shows in great detail how iText can be used for working with PDFs. It touches on topics ranging
from text, images, graphics, tables and fonts to forms and fields, interactive content, digital signatures, and web applications.
Each aspect is explained with numerous examples that can be applied to real-world problems right away.
The book also delves into the underlying PDF internals and PostScript details, and shows off capabilities that are not commonly
used, yet make for impressive documents.
The style is light and easily approachable, and if a particular subject is not of interest to the reader, it can usually be
just skimmed over (or entirely skipped) without impacting the understanding of later chapters.
This reviewer recommends the book for everyone using iText as a companion to the -quite extensive- online documentation that
is available as well. It covers many features of PDF that a casual user of Adobe Reader would not even think were possible,
and for which the javadocs alone are not sufficient introduction.
(Ulf Dittmer - Bartender,
March 2007)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Agile Java Development with Spring, Hibernate and Eclipse
Anil Hemrajani
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Sams
Published: 2006-05-19 |
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Bought and read this book from Safari-O'Reilly online.
The title itself gets the mood on.
This book will help you to understand and get started with Spring-Hibernate-Eclipse kind of projects.
This book is definitely a best shot for beginners in JEE.
Its not complete reference for every topics the author addresses, but will sure give you extended overview on XP, Agile etc.,
If you want to get started with your spring project immediately then this book is worth buying.
This book doesn't cover Spring AOP - Hmm.. Its a pity.
Its interesting to see the chapters that start with a discussion between programmers and client.
Getting the sample code up and running is also just a click of a Ant build button.
Configuring Eclipse/Spring/ANT have been covered in detail while many other key technologies were just started and finished
on a single page.
The appendix were quite useful, like AMDD, XP cheatsheet
Most commonly used technologies in JEE were addressed, so you can get to know what JEE is all about.
Altogether i recommend this book for Beginners and Intermediates to get know the beautiful world of JEE.
(Balaji Loganathan - Bartender,
February 2007)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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BIRT: A Field Guide to Reporting
Diana Peh, Alethea Hannemann, Nola Hague
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2006-11-05 |
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"BIRT: A Field Guide to Reporting" is a great tutorial for learning how to use BIRT. BIRT (Business Intelligence and Reporting
Tools) is described including its relationship to Eclipse. After covering how to install BIRT, the book goes into great detail
on how to use the report designer.
The target audience should be familiar with HTML, SQL and JavaScript as stated in the introduction. The book describes functions
used, but you are expected to know the basic syntax.
As expected, the book covers how to use each of the features of BIRT. They are all described with step by step instructions.
There are also a few tutorials walking you through the process from start to finish. I liked the "how to" style for tasks.
The book includes tips on how to plan a report and what to consider. It also includes common code snippets that you may want
to use and lists available functions.
I was particularly impressed with the abundance of screenshots and the excellent glossary. If you are thinking about using
BIRT, this book is a valuable addition to your library.
(Jeanne Boyarsky - Bartender,
January 2007)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Pro Apache Ant
Matthew Moodie
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Apress
Published: 2005-11-16 |
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Ant is one of those technologies that has an excellent manual and API online. This sets a higher standard for a book so
as not too just duplicate the Internet content. "Pro Apache Ant" meets this challenge.
The author walks you through a good number of the Ant tasks with examples and tips. The attributes are provided for common
tasks, so you have a physical reference. The author refers you to the manual for some of the less common tasks. A summary
of ant-contrib is provided since it is such a standard library. The author points to the Internet for a list of optional
tasks.
This book assumes you know Java and the packaging process. In other words, you should know what a jar and war are to understand
the sample application.
After walking through the common tasks and incrementally building a sample build.xml, the author delves into some more advanced
topics. Included are how to refactor a build file, accommodate large projects, custom tasks, mappers and how to use the Ant
API from a Java program.
The book doesn't have any fluff. It starts with an introduction to Ant and Ant's benefits. After a detailed explanation
of how to install Ant, you see the first Ant task. I recommend "Pro Apache Ant" if you are getting started with Ant or want
to know how to use it more powerfully.
(Jeanne Boyarsky - Bartender,
March 2006)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Hibernate In Action
Christian Bauer, Gavin King
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Manning Publications
Published: 2004-08-01 |
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Data persistence is quite naturally at the heart of most enterprise applications. There are a myriad of choices the Java
developer faces in choosing a persistence mechanism. JDBC and EJBs have long been the standard options, along with relative
newcomer JDO, and various commercial Object/Relational Mapping (ORM) solutions. All of these have their place, but they also
come with some baggage as well. Enter Hibernate, a popular open-source solution for ORM designed to meet some of the perceived
shortcomings of the more traditional Java persistence mechanisms.
Manning's "Hibernate In Action", written by two members of the core Hibernate team (including the project's founder), takes
the reader step-by-step through the process of getting up and running with Hibernate. The book begins with an introduction
to issues involved in object / relational persistence. Naturally, Hibernate addresses each concern raised with this topic.
Right from the beginning I couldn't help but get the feeling that the authors were trying to sell me something. The rest
of the book however proceeds in typical Manning "In Action" style by diving into the nuts and bolts of what it takes to get
up and running using Hibernate. An example application, an online auction application, is used throughout the book to illustrate
the implementation of a Hibernate solution. The examples are clear and easy to follow, and serve adequately to prepare the
reader to implement Hibernate in their own applications.
"Hibernate In Action" has to be considered the definitive tome on Hibernate. As the authors are intimately involved with
the project, the insight on Hibernate that they provide can't be easily duplicated. That said, the authors' own, often controversial,
opinions on common design practices (DTOs for example) are sprinkled liberally throughout the text, and this may turn off
some readers. Still, if your project is going to be using hibernate or is considering using Hibernate, this book is a must-have.
(Jason Menard - Bartender,
May 2005)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Building Portals with the Java Portlet API
Jeff Linwood, David Minter
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Apress
Published: 2004-08-23 |
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Information is as vital to success-striving companies and individuals as blood is to living creatures. As far as productivity
is concerned, it is critical that heterogeneous corporate information systems (such as, email systems, ERP, CMS, CRM, databases,
etc.) be organized in a way that allows employees at any level of the organization to seamlessly exploit and manage the massive
amount of stored and generated data. This book introduces the value proposition of corporate portals when it comes to dealing
with the problematic of efficient information organization and management.
Building on their long experience of developing corporate portals, the authors demonstrate how to create JSR 168 (Java Portlet
API) compliant enterprise portals. They first introduce basic portlets concepts and go on explaining how to create, package,
deploy and configure portlets, how to let users personalize them, how to provide single sign-on security, and how to expose
portlets to the outside world or to make use of remote web service portlets. A couple of other interesting topics are also
touched upon, such as creating RSS, syndication and search portlets, using portlets with JSP and servlets and integrating
portlets with JSR 170 (Java Content Repository API) compliant content management systems.
If you find yourself routinely switching among several different applications to carry out your daily activities and you
are dreaming at night of a single entry point to all your information systems, remember that this book is not an expenditure,
it's an investment !
(Valentin Crettaz - Sheriff,
April 2005)
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Apress
Published: 2004-08-23 |
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Portals are becoming more popular as companies are looking for a single web-based entry point into their various applications.
Java provides a standard portal model with JSR 168. This book is a thorough introduction into JSR 168 that will help get portal
developers up to speed into this relatively new specification.
The first seven chapters an excellent introduction into developing portlets. Response and request objects are covered in
detail. The portlet life cycle is clearly explained. Deployment descriptors are discussed. Integrating with Servlets and JSPs
is described. The remainder of the book covers more advanced topics. Anyone working with a portal knows the problems with
providing single sign-on to multiple applications. The authors discuss this issue giving several examples. The authors cover
syndication, searching, personalization, web services, content management, and more.
My only complaint with the book is that it uses the Apache Pluto portal, which is not in final release yet. Pluto is an open
source portal but it is complicated to distribute content to it (you are forced to use Maven). When the book explains how
to distribute portlets to Pluto it gets a little confusing because the authors need to explain multiple configuration files,
some of which are exclusive to Pluto. Other than this one problem, the book gives a solid introduction to developing a portal
providing detailed information of both the basics and many advanced concepts. Clearly the authors understand portal development
and know how to pass that information on to their readers.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
December 2004)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Java Developer's Guide To Eclipse
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Second edition
Jim D'Anjou, Scott Fairbrother, Dan Kehn, John Kellerman, Pat McCarthy
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2004-11-05 |
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The first edition of this book was excellent for plug-in developers and helpful, although not vital, to all others. Two
things make this new edition even better than the first edition. First, plug-in development in Eclipse is now easy and so
well explained in this book that there is no reason not to try it. Have you ever worked with an IDE and thought, "why isn't
this function available in the pop-up menu" or "why doesn't it have this feature"? Developing a plug-in will allow you to
customize Eclipse to provide the missing feature and this book will clearly explain exactly how to do that. Second, the section
of the book that deals with developing with Eclipse has been improved with detailed chapters on team development including
using CVS as well as an excellent example of integrating with Tomcat to develop an E-Commerce application.
The book is divided into two sections. The first 200 pages deal with using Eclipse and cover everything from the basics to
complex team development issues. The next 600 pages cover everything you need to know about extending Eclipse. The book ends
with 200 pages of exercises that give detailed, step-by-step examples. Five exercises deal with using Eclipse while the rest
show examples of extending Eclipse. It is a big book that covers a lot of material but it covers it clearly and with plenty
of examples. If you buy one Eclipse book, this should be it.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
January 2005)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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First edition
Sherry Shavor, Jim D'Anjou, Dan Kehn, Scott Fairbrother, John Kellerman, Pat McCarthy
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2003-05-19 |
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The authors of this book are part of a core IBM group formed to share knowledge of the Eclipse universal IDE. The first
part of this book deals with using Eclipse from a Java developers point of view. I found this was not any more helpful than
the documentation available on the Eclipse web site. Eclipse works extensively with plugins that can be integrated into the
Eclipse environment to provide new functionality. I would have liked to see something on some of the more popular plugins
such as those used to run application servers. Even a list of where to go to get plugins would have been helpful. Unfortunately,
this part of the book only covers the basics of what comes with Eclipse and does not discuss any existing plugins.
The second part of the book, about 450 pages, covers writing your own plugins. This part of the book is excellent. It covers
not just the basics, but virtually everything you need to know to write plugins. Whether you wish to code a new toolbar,
editor, specialized view, or wizard, it is all covered in this section. With this book you will be writing plugins in a fraction
of the time you would have otherwise spent. The book also contains exercises which allow you to test your new knowledge.
If your only goal is to use Eclipse then you don't need this book. If your desire is to write plugins then I wouldn't even
try without it.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
June 2003)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Java Studio Creator Field Guide
Gail Anderson, Paul Anderson
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Prentice Hall PTR
Published: 2004-07-08 |
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Sun's Java Studio Creator makes use of JavaServer Faces (JSF) to allow visual development similar to Microsoft's Visual Studio.
It is an easy to use IDE that allows you to drag and drop components, validators, and converters to build a web application.
Much of the code required is automatically generated by the tool. This book a well-written and easy to follow step-by-step
tutorial that will teach you how to use the IDE and quickly create web applications.
The book starts with a chapter on Java that can be easily ignored. The next chapter gives a quick introduction to the IDE.
The authors demonstrate many of the basic techniques and show how to use the visual features to create navigation for a multi-page
web site. The third chapter discusses each of the JSF components that are available in the IDE. Chapters four and five demonstrate
how to use these components to build a web application. The examples are simple but show how to integrate the generated code
with generated beans. Chapters six and seven show how to integrate Web Services and databases into your application. Chapter
eight looks at internationalization and writing custom validators. The final chapter covers debugging.
If you have a copy of the software and want to utilize it to the fullest then this book is well worth buying. If you don't
have the software then look at ISBN 0131499947 to purchase the book and the software together.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
November 2004)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Pro Jakarta Velocity: From Professional to Expert
Rob Harrop
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Apress
Published: 2004-08-30 |
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Velocity is an open source template framework designed to simplify the task of generating text-based output. The Velocity
documentation available from Apache is short, low on examples, and leaves holes. This book fills in the gaps and gives excellent
coverage of the many features that are available with Velocity.
The book starts with an introduction to Velocity and then explains how to install and configure it. The author then discusses
the Velocity Template Language, examines its shortcomings, and demonstrates how to get around them. Best practices are covered
early in the book. Although Velocity is normally thought of as a web-based framework, the author doesn't let us forget that
it can be used for both stand-alone and web applications and gives us detailed chapters on both. Velocity tools are well
covered including Anakia, which can be used to transform XML. The Velocity architecture is explained as well as ways to extend
that architecture.
The examples are well thought out and give good coverage of the features of Velocity. The most interesting part of the
examples is how little work it is to integrate Velocity into a well-designed framework. The author shows how Velocity fits
into both Struts and Spring, demonstrating that Velocity is not meant to replace these frameworks but rather to simplify content
generation in any framework. I can strongly recommend this book for anyone interested in Velocity. For anyone not interested
in Velocity, the question is, why not?
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
November 2004)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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J2ME Games with MIDP2
Carol Hamer
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Apress
Published: 2004-06-01 |
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I really enjoyed this book. The author does a solid job of explaining everything you need to know to write games for MIDP
devices. If you are familiar with Jonathan Knudsen's book on J2ME (probably the best book on the subject), this book expands
the single games chapter into a fun and interesting book.
The book starts with a quick sample showing us how to use the Sun IDE and how to run our games on the emulator and how to
download our games to a phone. The author shows a couple of example games, a maze and a jumping game, that give a good overview
of the basic techniques games use on MIDP devices. She then expands those examples by showing proper use of threads and shows
how to play tones and music during a game. Storing information (such as high scores or user preferences) is demonstrated.
Downloading game enhancements such as new levels for a dungeon game are also demonstrated. The book is full of well-commented
code samples (worth stealing) that show the techniques being discussed.
The author of this book has a nice, easy to read style of writing. Her enthusiasm for the topic comes through and makes you
wants to try the many sample games. If you have been spending too much time on enterprise programming then playing around
with some MIDP games might be just the antidote and this book will get you started on the fun.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
October 2004)
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Apress
Published: 2004-06-01 |
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Well, I have been putting off this review for a week and a half now. I have a difficult time when I have to post a bad review.
I feel bad for the author, and all the time that they put into writing these books.
I was really looking forward to reading this book, as a couple of friends of mine want to write a mobile device game. I thought
I would be able to learn how in this book.
In J2ME Games with MIDP2, the authors attempts to teach us how to use the Game API package that is included in MIDP2.0. Unfortunately,
the book spends way too much time giving code, than in really explaining the best ways to use the API. I'd say 1/2 of the
book is just code. Plus the code has so many comments that it makes it very difficult to read the code. I would have suggested
printing snippets, and describing it with prose.
The games that are samples are pretty cool, and I think they are great examples that could have been put to better use.
If you get Jonathan Knudsen's book on J2ME, also printed by Apress, you can learn just as much, but only in 22 pages.
(Mark Spritzler - Bartender,
August 2004)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Contributing to Eclipse - Principles, Patterns, and Plug-Ins
Erich Gamma, Kent Beck
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2003-10-30 |
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"Contributing to Eclipse" is a great read. More importantly, as someone who is in the middle of their first major Eclipse
plugin development project, I learned a lot -- even though I've previously read every other available book on the topic. Gamma
and Beck take you through the development of a fairly sophisticated plugin, step by step. Perhaps most welcome, the plugin
they develop isn't a syntax-highlighting text editor (an example that's already been done to death,) but a set of tools for
running JUnit tests on Java code!
This is the only book I've seen that discusses testing and Test-Driven Development of plugins, a must for serious plugin
developers. As you'd expect from the developers of JUnit, they use JUnit to test every piece of functionality they add.
Surprisingly, even though you'd expect some confusing in writing about using JUnit to test a JUnit plugin, there's none. Gamma
and Beck are both excellent writers, and they know this subject matter inside out.
A word of warning: this is neither an introduction to nor a reference for Eclipse plugin programming. I don't think I would
have gotten nearly as much from this book if I hadn't read "Eclipse in Action" and "The Java Programmer's Guide to Eclipse"
first. But if you've gotten beyond the novice level with Eclipse, I guarantee you'll learn something by reading this book.
(Ernest Friedman-Hill - Sheriff,
September 2004)
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2003-10-30 |
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Eclipse is the name of both an open source IDE and the extensible framework that it is built upon. A little experience of
using Eclipse as an IDE, and a desire to extend the framework further are needed for this book. Before you know it, you'll
be developing your first plug-in. Of course, it's a 'Hello World', but it introduces the concepts you need to go on to bigger
and better things. The 'bigger and better' thing the book provides is a JUnit plug-in that performs automatic unit tests
during builds. The authors don't just teach you how to build a plug-in, but how to build a plug-in that 'plays well with
others' and allows for your plug-in to be extended in the future. Wrapping up the book are a collection of 'pattern stories'
describing some of the design patterns used in Eclipse. The clear writing style and the flow of topics will help you get
up to speed and writing plug-ins in no time. If you need further details on a topic ample references to the Eclipse documentation
or other books that will help you on the subject are provided. All-in-all this book is a great resource for anyone that wants
to extend the functionality of Eclipse.
(Nathan Pruett - Bartender,
November 2003)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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How Tomcat Works
Budi Kurniawan, Paul Deck
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BrainySoftware.com
Published: 2004-04 |
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This is best book to sit and read near by a fire but additionally you need a computer with you from time to time. I was very
much pleased with the way author had described the interior design of Tomcat with reference to Catalina from a very simple
component to the complex one. This book will sure help you to learn the big picture of Tomcat and its components and will
also help you to run sample application servers.
It is highly recommended to download the code and use them as reference while reading and testing the chapters. This book
covers both Tomcat 4 and 5 with a tiny note what has been changed from Tomcat 4 to 5.
I also liked the UML diagram and the collaboration diagram at the beginning of each/some chapters, this gives you the big
picture of the package/class structure before you get into the very detail of every java class
After reading this book, if you happen to see some runtime errors from Tomcat, you will sure be able to say where and why
it is happening
The book also act as a best documentation for entire Tomcat package, which you will not get even if you spend days on Tomcat
website.
I would also recommend this book to any java programmer who want to see how a complex tool like Tomcat was build, which in-turn
can help you to apply that knowledge while building your own in-house software.
(Balaji Loganathan - Bartender,
September 2004)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Eclipse: Building Commercial-Quality Plug-ins
Eric Clayberg, Dan Rubel
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2004-06-27 |
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When I first approached developing a JUnitFaces plug-in for Eclipse 3.0, as I'd never before developed an Eclipse plug-in,
I quickly found myself bombarded by a lot of new things to figure out - many of which are not well-covered in the on-line
documentation. As luck would have it, I got a copy of "Eclipse: Building Commercial-Quality Plug-ins" and it covers everything.
In this book, the authors, Eric Clayberg and Dan Rubel, provide step-by-detailed-step instructions on what seems like every
design and implementation consideration surrounding developing high quality plug-ins for Eclipse, and its commercial big brother,
IBM's WebSphere Studio Workbench. These lessons include liberal and effective use of code examples, annotated screenshots
and diagrams.
While reading "Eclipse: Building Commercial-Quality Plug-ins" and developing a JUnitFaces plug-in for Eclipse 3.0, I repeatedly
found myself thinking things like: "Wow! That wasn't in the on-line documentation," "That's good to know," and "I wouldn't
have done that correctly the first fifty times, if I hadn't just read a great explanation about it."
I'll be referring to this book as "The Eclipse Plug-ins Development Bible" every time I pull it off the shelf for reference
while plugging away at my plug-in project.
If you're developing a plug-in for Eclipse or WebSphere Studio Workbench, and you'd like it to work, but you don't have this
book, get a copy, now.
(Dirk Schreckmann - Sheriff,
September 2004)
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2004-06-27 |
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As the title suggests, this massive tome is intended as a guide to best practices for writing Eclipse plug-ins. I think in
that respect it succeeds handily.
If you've been living in a hole: Eclipse is a phenomenally successful, infinitely extensible open-source Java IDE. By many
estimates, 60% or more of Java developers are using it. Not everyone realizes that Eclipse has a big brother: IBM's commercial
WebSphere Application Developer (WSAD) is a branded version of Eclipse bundled with an enormous range of add-ons (or "plug-ins",
as they're more properly called.) IBM maintains a certification program, the "Ready For WebSphere" (RFWS) label, which involves
meeting a suite of requirements and tests aimed at making an Eclipse plug-in into a best-of-breed tool that works well in
the WSAD environment.
In a methodical, workmanlike way, Clayberg and Rubel wend their way through the components of a professionally-produced plug-in,
with an eye towards qualifying for the RWFS certification. There is no fat to be trimmed here. Instead, this book focuses
on enumerating everything from the solid underpinnings to the little touches that make a plug-in into a dependable, useable
tool.
The book includes many screen shots and some nice UML diagrams. It's nicely up to date, as the step-by-step instructions
and screen shots pertain to the recently-released Eclipse version 3.0 .
Before you even think about distributing a plug-in you've written, read this book.
(Ernest Friedman-Hill - Sheriff,
September 2004)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Java Cookbook: Solutions and Examples for Java Developers
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Second edition
by Ian Darwin
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O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Published: 2004-06-14 |
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Ever gotten tired of wading through endless r | |
