Rating: 
Summary: First and last book, but not the only book for SCJP
Review: It is certainly a very good book for SCJP. It is concise, easy to read and very exam-oriented. It should be the first book to read. But it is not complete, the explanation is often too short and not detailed enough (comparing to the two books I list below), especially for inner classes, LayoutManager, java IO, Thread, etc. If you only want to pass the exam, this book may be good enough; if you really want to have solid knowledge of java fundamental, please read following books as well: A Programmer's Guide to Java Certification by Khalid Azim Mughal, Rolf Rasmussen The Complete Java 2 Certification Study Guide by Simon Roberts, Philip Heller, Michael Ernest The above two books contain more info, some info are good to know, but unnecessary for the exam. They concentrate less on the exam than this book. Start from this book and than read the other two books, read this book again (or just do the Practical Questions at the end of each chapter and Sample Test at the end of the book) before the real exam. Read the Cram Sheet at the beginning of the book one hour before the exam. And you will pass. Good luck!
Rating: 
Summary: Good coverage on Exam topics
Review: To prepare for the SCJP exam, I started by programming and reading the Complete Java2 Certification Guide (by Heller) first, followed by using this book about just 10 days before the exam. These two books focus on topics differently and certainly make up for the weak part of each other. In fact, the Java2 Exam Cram offers some insight on Java in addition to the coverage of the SCJP exam itself. The sample questions are more difficult in this book while some questions on the real exam are trickier. If you can score 75-80 on the final exam in both books, you should be ready for the exam (passing score is 60). This book has good coverage on Thread, Event, Garbage collection, inner class, Flow control and Exception. Make sure you understand everything in the book so that you will feel very confident on the real exam day. Good luck.
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Summary: Regarding A reader from Lee's Summit's Review
Review: | is both a bitwise and logical op in Java unlike in C or C++. The || op is called the conditional-or. See page 388 and 389 of the Java language spec, 2nd ed.
Rating:
Summary: Great book that serves as a compact test prep
Review: I just passed the test with an 85 and this book was my main test preparation source for the Java Programmer's Exam. I had programmed in C years before and was looking to sharpen my technical skills with a forefront technology like Java. After doing a Sun CBT to learn Java and practicing up, I used this book to learn what tricks I needed to know to pass the exam. It's small enough to read thoroughly and it does an excellent job of reinforcing the "gotcha's" you need to know to pass the test. The sample test in the back is a great representation of the questions on the test, but the questions on the book's web site will be very familiar once you take the test in the book. The good thing about the web site is that it links you to other sources of more sample tests - and there are plenty out there. Although this book is not a definitive language reference, it really does prepare you for the exam.
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Summary: Factual error on the VERY FIRST PAGE!....
Review: You would think that a study guide would be pretty accurate, but ... WOW! I found several factual errors on the very first page of the book. The following error is on the "Cram Sheet" which is the very first page of the book (right behind the cover). The Cram Sheet says "Logical OR operators | and ||." Well, | is not a logical operator; it is a bitwise arithmetic operator. It goes on to say in the next two sentences "The | operator always evaluates both operands. The || operator 'short-circuits' an evaluation and does not evaluate the right hand term ...". WOW!!!!!!!!!! Nuf said!!!!!!!!!!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Not a bad choice, but don't make it your primary study guide
Review: I had just passed the Sun Certified Programmer for the Java 1.4 Platform exam (with a score of 80%), and I want to help prospective test takers in finding the "right" Java study guide. I bewildered by the number of books available, and I had to try many of them before I settled on the right one. Here are my short reviews for each of the major Java study guides: "Sun Certified Programmer & Developer for Java 2 Study Guide" by Kathy Sierra and Bert Bates (five stars): I felt this book was the best among all the Java study guides. Both the authors were responsible for the Java certification exam's development, and the practice questions are *very* similar to the actual exam. The authors also cover exactly what will be on the 1.4 exam, pointing out potential topics, questions, and pitfalls. I can't recommend this book highly enough. "A Programmer's Guide to Java Certification" by Khalid Mughal and Rolf Rasmussen (four stars): This is a good choice if you plan on taking the 1.2 exam. The book also has a dual purpose of teaching Java and sometimes goes beyond the actual scope of the exam, but it is nonetheless excellent. However, as the title suggests, this isn't the book for you if you don't have any programming experience. Also, the book's practice questions are much, much harder than the actual exam. "Complete Java 2 Certification Study Guide (3rd Edition)" by Philip Heller and Simon Roberts (two stars): This was the most disappointing book of all. I don't know why so many people swear by it, but the book appeared to have been rushed into production. Many of the errors and typos have been updated in the book's second printing, but the book's coverage of topics is quite weak. Lastly, the practice questions were not only too easy, but they don't look very similar to how questions look on the real test. It's not a terrible book (many people appear to have passed the exam with just this book), but there are better options. "Java 2 Exam Prep" by Bill Brodgen (three stars): This compact study guide isn't a bad choice for prospective test takers with a good Java foundation. It covers all the exam's topics succinctly, but as another reviewer noted, it should not be your primary study guide. I personally did not find the book particularly useful. Lastly, sign up for Sun's ePractice practice exams. You'll get three sample tests, and they will help you prepare for the exam by showing you how the questions will look and what type of questions they will ask. I didn't like the idea of spending the extra money, but the practice exams definitely helped me prepare for the real thing.
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Summary: I highly recommended this book
Review: I'm not so agree with some of the comment that have been posted on this book, I have used this book for my preparation for SCJP exam and till now after two years, I still have farely good impression on the book and refer it in my day to day work. I admit this book cant be used solely as the only guide especially for newbie but it serve as a good complement to a more detail guide, i pick up tricks from this book which I cant find in other place, in certain area it really shield light when I was confused by other material. I passed with 86% from zero knowledge of Java in less than 3 months time, I think this book have lift me up to certain level.
Get it if you want to score high and pass at the first time
Rating:
Summary: Good book for reveiw, but you might need another
Review: This book was great for review after going over the material. If you're already very familiar with Java then this might be the only book you need. If not, I'd go with the Complete Java 2 Certification Guide by Roberts, Heller and Ernest as well. I found the books complemented each other well. This book has excellent questions that really get you thinking and ensure have a good understanding of the topics covered.
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Summary: This book is worthless. Buy another Certification Guide
Review: Steer clear of this book. It is worthless. Instead, buy one of the countless other certification-training books avail on " I bought this book to do my final prep for the Java2 Programmer's exam (310-025). The book has plenty of practice questions and quizzes, which Coriolis says are designed to represent the same types of questions and programming problems in the actual exam. I foolishly assumed that was true. Nothing could be further from the truth! Take it from someone who HAS taken the certification exam: this book is worthless. It's chapter topics, practice questions, and study tips are about as misleading as they could possibly be. There was not a single question on the real exam, which bore any resemblance whatsoever, to anything in this book. Not only were the practice questions written in a completely different style than those of the exam, but they didn't even cover any of the units detailed in this book. The book actually diverted me from studying the proper elements of the Java language! It wasted my time and efforts in elements of the language which were never once even alluded to in the exam. Even the wording; the style of the practice questions, was off the target. You need to know the truth--because the book's cover and its preface both tout it as being written "based on the actual exam", by experts who have taken the exam, and using old exams as the model for their practice questions". This cl is extremely deceitful. Buy another study guide.
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Summary: Sufficient to get you through the exam, but nothing more.
Review: I used only this book to study for my exam, and I did all the practice questions in the book. When I took the exam, I was suprised to find that the questions on the actual exam are no where like the practice questions. In addition, the book does a poor coverage on Java IO so I failed the IO section of the exam miserably (and that section weighs heavily in the exam). To be fair, the book covers everything else nicely and did get me through the exam (although I barely passed it). I still use it as a reference from time to time.
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