Professional Jakarta Struts

Rating:
Summary: At last, a good Struts book!
Review: I have five Struts books and this is the best by far. There is NO fluff in it. It has THE BEST appendices of any Struts book, showing the tag library calls. (It makes a great reference book.) The examples are clean and get right to the point. I liked the style where they show one way to achieve a goal, explain how it can be done better, then show a better way, etc., refining the example as they go.

I also liked the short, to-the-point chapters on using Struts with Eclipse, databases, Tiles, etc. This is the only book I've read that made it clear how to use Tiles.

There are two down-sides to this book. First, it has an poor index, which is normally the kiss of death on a technical book. Secondly, the example code that is on the web-site is a mess! Those are the reasons I gave this a 4-star instead of a 5-star rating. (Some of the code may be out of date, too, but I have given up expecting a printed book to be current with programming API's that seem to change daily.)

On top of all that, the price is right!



Rating:
Summary: already a bit behind
Review: I have two gripes with this book. First, it's really a shame that the authors didn't take the time to include information about Unix/Linux installation and configuation since the vast majority of us will be deploying on those platforms, if not developing on them outright. Secondly, the book is a little behind the curve regarding Struts 1.1. For example, the use of Struts tag libraries has been considerably simplified and the file upload example on page 391 uses the deprecated FormFile class instead of Jakarta FileUpload. It's only natural for APIs to change, but if you plan on buying this book, be prepared to spend some additional time on the Jakarta web site.

Rating:
Summary: Bad Coding in Examples
Review: It seems to me that the two authors do not have much experience with good coding practices. The examples presented in the book contain useless idioms such as 'new String("success")'. A book with the word "professional" in the title should try to promote a better style.

Rating:
Summary: Need Info. for LINUX and Unix
Review: The book should include the materials for Linux and Unix platform.

Rating:
Summary: This book needs help
Review: This book is VERY poorly edited. Yes, by brute force I've learned a bit more about Struts than what I'd already learned previously from a few tutorials.

It seems these authors may know lots about the topic but do NOT communicate it well. Topics are introduced within other topics without so much as an explanation. Actions, ActionMappings, ActionErrors, etc., are introduced without sufficient explanation as to why and in what situations they should be used. There are errors throughout. In sample code on a page an explanation refers to "highlighted lines in the code". -- Nothing is highlighted!!! This is just the tip of the iceberg.

I downloaded the sample code from the Wrox web site and it is in disarray.

After looking around the Wrox site it seems they are in disarray as well. It seems they've been bought, sold, or whatever recently.

After having published such a great book with XSLT, 2nd edition by Michael Kay back in April, 2001, I'm highly disappointed with this recent (2003) Wrox publication.

A good book not only requires authors competent in the subject matter (which these *seem* to be) but need to have the ability to communicate/teach the topic well. And, editors are necessary to ensure cohesion, consistency, and accuracy. The later two have clearly not been accomplished here.

I feel burned and would be reluctant to get another book from Wrox unless and until they can somehow prove they can raise the bar significantly.

BUYER BEWARE!

Rating:
Summary: Great book on Jakarta Struts.
Review: Title: Professional Jakarta Struts
Edition: 1st Edition(?)
Author: James Goodwill and Richard Hightower
City: Indianapolis, IN 46256
Publisher: Wrox Publishers, John Wiley and Sons
Published Date: Winter 2003/2004.

5=Well done! This book will be a valuable teaching and reference tool.

4=I would recommend this book to someone interested in its topic.

5=A complete reference. I would not need any additional reference on this topic.

Write a minimum of three paragraphs describing the different aspects of this book.

This is an excellent book on Jakarta Struts. Wrox publishers and the authors had done an excellent job in explaining the concepts of Jakarata struts. the book begins with servlet containers, jsps (upto 2 chapters) and how the struts fits
into the scheme of things.

the book goes into different aspects of the struts, the MVC, and the controller concepts. there are a lot of examples to explain the concepts for people of various expertise and background.

the book also shows how to debug in 2 different environments such as eclipse and Jidea. the authors have shown how to create a new application from scratch in the last chapter
and that is an excellent way to implement a Jakarta struts application.

this book is a great reference book.

Rating:
Summary: Great book on Jakarta Struts.
Review: Title: Professional Jakarta Struts
Edition: 1st Edition(?)
Author: James Goodwill and Richard Hightower
City: Indianapolis, IN 46256
Publisher: Wrox Publishers, John Wiley and Sons
Published Date: Winter 2003/2004.

5=Well done! This book will be a valuable teaching and reference tool.

4=I would recommend this book to someone interested in its topic.

5=A complete reference. I would not need any additional reference on this topic.

Write a minimum of three paragraphs describing the different aspects of this book.

This is an excellent book on Jakarta Struts. Wrox publishers and the authors had done an excellent job in explaining the concepts of Jakarata struts. the book begins with servlet containers, jsps (upto 2 chapters) and how the struts fits
into the scheme of things.

the book goes into different aspects of the struts, the MVC, and the controller concepts. there are a lot of examples to explain the concepts for people of various expertise and background.

the book also shows how to debug in 2 different environments such as eclipse and Jidea. the authors have shown how to create a new application from scratch in the last chapter
and that is an excellent way to implement a Jakarta struts application.

this book is a great reference book.

Rating:
Summary: Fantastic to get you started...
Review: When I first started with struts, I read several pieces on the subject, but none of it "jelled" for me...that is up until I read this book.

You will need additional reference material after you get into serious development - but, as a "Hello World", this book is great.