Peter Norton's Guide to Java Programming

Rating:
Summary: Ambitious but superficial
Review: I don't agree with all the praise this book has been granted. There are methodological mistakes such as introducing basic concepts using more advanced ones that haven't been explained yet, or skimming important concepts (eg OOP) and hurriedly passing on to plunge into less relevant details. It helps as a path to follow but you definitely will need deeper and clearer approaches to many topics. While it boasts to be addressed at both the beginner and the advanced user, it doesn't seem to help much either: the first will have confused and superficial ideas while the later will squeeze 800 pages to learn from less than 200 (mostly unrelevant details). Try "The Java Series"; "Programming Language" and "Tutorial" for beginners and the "Annotated Reference" for more advanced users; you'll be much better off. This "Guide" promises a lot but won't take you much farther with its inconsistently targeted broad audience. Don't worry about the CD-ROM either, what you're missing is simply ordinary stuff

Rating:
Summary: Great book! It really really helped me...
Review: I highly recommend this book! Recently, the firm I work at decided to shift headlong into Java development. With the introduction of the NC and the NetPC, there's an entire market that is virtually untapped for business applets and applications. This book was the only book I found that answered all my questions pertaining to Java applets AND Java applications. In most other books, the discussion about Java applications gets lost. Not so in this book. Another area of Java programming that is very important is advanced programming issues. This book leads you through intermediate and advanced Java programming; all done by example, which is terrific. With this book, I was finally able to get beyond the basics and leave the land of Hello World! If you buy no other Java book, buy this one. If you already have a Java book, buy this one anyway and put it within easy reach. You will use it regularly

Rating:
Summary: This is THE one to Get!
Review: I went through 5 other "beginners" books on Java before finding this gem. It can take someone with no OOP experience and actually make sense out of objects, methods, instantiation,classes, types....and all the other abstractions that other books make complicated. Very well written and easy to follow. If you have no programming experience, or only know COBOL, like myself, I would get this book to get started in JAVA

Rating:
Summary: okay but not for the novice
Review: This guide to java programming was informative and thorough, however, i would not suggest it for a user of little or no prior java experience. Many of the explanations of java concepts I claim are difficult for the novice user to comprehende and I would recommend something a little more simpler.

Rating:
Summary: Not for beginners
Review: With over 15 years of programming experience and no experience with Java, I found this book difficult to follow. I normally like to dig right in with numerous examples so I can test what I have learned. This book has few meaningful examples and when they do exist, the author uses concepts which have not been covered yet. Confusing! After reading half the book I am now searching for a more beginner book.