JavaBooks.org :: Latest Reviews

AspectJ in Action, Second Edition

Reviewer: Manuel Jordan

This powerful book teaches us how to learn AOP and how apply AspectJ and Spring AOP in our projects with very valuable theory including a lot of images to get an excellent understanding. All these features help make development life easier both with and without Spring framework. The book also covers important topics like Management, Security, Constraints, Concurrency and valuable patterns Intent and Audience is for pure Java Developers and Spring developers with the intentions to apply a better Modularizing some project Have a well Modulared project or even create it and for that trying to avoid code tangling and code scattering and have a well definition for core concerns and crosscutting concerns can be painful This book teaches us how apply AOP using AspectJ and Spring AOP to resolve these problems. The book is easy to understand and follow, with images everywhere to have an excellent understanding, enjoy its 568 pages For a complet [...]

Added on: 2010-03-07

Pro Spring Dynamic Modules for OSGi™ Service Platforms

Reviewer: Manuel Jordan

This book covers the OSGi world with Spring Dynamic Modules , in an easy approach with excellent material and clever images. There are some key chapters and realistic topics which are covered in this book. The theory isn't too complicated and there are a good amount of table discussions. Intent and Audience is for Spring developers with the desire to start the journeying into the OSGi world with Spring The book is pretty good with content and explanation of the core topics, having, excellent images to complement excellent ideas. The code is not complicated and you can easily understand the material for each chapter For a complete review for each chapter for this book, you can follow with our friends in DZone available here Pro Spring Dynamic Modules for OSGi Service Platforms

Added on: 2010-03-07

SCJP Sun Certified Programmer for Java 6 Study Guide

Reviewer: Joseph Pachod

In order to get ready for the SCJP 6 exam, I went for this book. The authors make clear at the beginning that the book is about, and only about, being ready for the SCJP exam. No more, no less. And they keep to their words : the book is immensely focused on the exam. The bad consequence is that sometime (often) I was eager to know more, to go further the "there's plenty more to tell, but that's enough for the exam, so we stop here". Furthermore, as you can imagine, this isn't the most fancy book I've ever read. Katherine and Bert do attempt a few times to instill some fun in it, but it didn't fall quite right. The very quite side is that the book shows all you need to know, no more, no less. I would even go a bit further : if the authors say "methods X and Y are also part of the exam", then you should really know exactly what's in these methods. Really. I'm pretty sure I lost some points due to some API I didn't know enough. Even better, they say clearly what's in t [...]

Added on: 2010-02-11

Flex 3 with Java

Reviewer: Eirik Hoem

Short version: If you are a Java / PHP developer seeking to get started with Flex, building on your skills as a server-side developer, this book will do you good. If you are new to software development, or just started out I would recommend you check out Essential ActionScript 3.0 by Colin Mook, then come back to this book when you have some experience doing applications with AS3. Slightly longer version: Some time ago I reviewed Mastering phpMyAdmin 3.1 from Packt Publishing, and since they had some interesting books on Flash / Flex I volunteered to review a few more. First out is Flex 3 with Java. It’s a 300 page book, dealing with Flex, Java and how you can build solutions using BlazeDS as a backend. I first checked out Flex back when the Flex 3 beta came out. At that time I was doing PHP with the Prado Framework, and instantly felt like home within the Flex IDE. However, I never took the time to really get into Flex, and my knowledge of ActionScript was pretty limit [...]

Added on: 2010-02-09

Spring Recipes: A Problem-Solution Approach

Reviewer: Manuel Jordan

This wonderful book, Spring Recipes, covers in a excellent way Spring 2.5 from basic to advanced and in many cases some compatible configurations for 1.x, scalable. It is a way to learn each chapter throught the book, 19 well-organized chapters that cover the most important topics in the J2EE world with Spring, and of course, Spring core itself This book is for beginners and medium Spring developer programmers. Advanced programmers would find this book useful as a reference. In other words if you buy this book you are not wasting your money. This book has an excellent structured approach to learn for any reader. Concrete theory and good realistic examples. Dear Members In These days any aspirant to Java Developer must learn in some point to work with J2EE. The decision can be easy but the huge problem appears in how to learn this from the scratch. Years ago the only option to work with J2EE was EJB (a wonderful pain), now, Spring, our savior. The obvious [...]

Added on: 2009-12-03

Spring Web Flow 2 Web Development

Reviewer: Manuel Jordan

This book teaches us how to work with Spring Web Flow 2.0.x using a scalable learning approach applying the new features, over seven well-organized chapters. I consider this book oriented to any Spring Developer with the desire to quickly learn how to work with Spring Web Flow 2.0.X from scratch, developers who already have experience with 2.0.x and even with SWF 1.0.x will find this book a useful reference. You are not overloaded in the learning process with this material. Web Development is important, and furthermore considering conversation states in a Web Process and Spring handles this with Spring Web Flow (SWF). With the new version release SWF 2.0.X and with its news features, the work for a developer is more easier. The book assumes some Spring knowledge, Spring Web Flow developers for 1.0.x would find this material useful to learn the new features and how it is possible to save time with them. Beginners using SWF 2.0.x are able to learn quickl [...]

Added on: 2009-12-03

Spring 2.5 Aspect Oriented Programming

Reviewer: Manuel Jordan

This book, teaches us Spring 2.5.x with Aspect Oriented Programming (Annotations and XML well cover) with a scalable learning approach, over 8 well-organized chapters, realistic and necessary Crosscutting Concerns are covered. I consider this book oriented more towards beginners and medium Spring/AOP developer programmers. This book has a good structured approach to learn for any reader. It has concrete theory and good realistic examples. (Not overloading learning process). AOP itself is complex for the first time that a beginner starts to learn it. This book avoids this problem by keeping the things simple and not overloading with heavy theory. That means the theory and practice are not poor (superficial) or too detailed. Developers with some experience with AOP, would find this book very good for reference in a practical approach, as it has a long good amount the samples about configuration for xml and annotations. For its 300 pages I consider this book [...]

Added on: 2009-12-03

DWR Java AJAX Applications

Reviewer: Manuel Jordan

This book covers many topics with DWR for a client and server side with concrete theory and a good amount the code. Furthermore Geronimo including DataBase and ActiveMQ are covered. Web Services with Eclipse are explained too at a higher level. I consider this book mostly oriented for Web Developers with the desire to integrate DWR in your application or learn it from the scratch. Web Development is critical and most used in these days, and with Ajax out there, learning many Ajax frameworks is mandatory for us. DWR is perhaps the framework most used based in Java in many Web Applications, you can even integrate with Spring. The book covers the client side well with a lot of pages about javascript code working with DWR, and the server side is covered too Beginners could use this book with some complementation in the Web. This book has a good structured approach to learn for any reader.For medium developers you would find this book as a very good how-to guide/ [...]

Added on: 2009-12-03

The Definitive Guide to Terracotta: Cluster the JVM for Spring, Hibernate and POJO Scalability

Reviewer: Manuel Jordan

This book covers many topics with Terracotta Clustering and Grid Computing for server side, along with concrete theory and a good amount of code with clever and important images. Integration with Spring, Hibernate are included in this book. Java developers who want to start the journey to clustering world! must read this book Clustering is an important topic to have a well balanced application among many machines. With many classic solutions out there, Terracotta offers a simple, powerful and valuable solution The book covers this well with a lot of pages about Java code working alone and with Terracotta of course For beginners/medium developers you would find this book as a very good how-to guide/reference, because it has concrete theory and action in samples For its 368 pages I consider this book a good material for learning Terracotta from the Scratch I hope you enjoy this book like I did For a complete review for each chapter for this book, [...]

Added on: 2009-12-03

JBoss Tools 3 Developers Guide

Reviewer: Manuel Jordan

This book teaches us how use use JBoss Tools 3 step by step including a lot of images to get a better understanding. All this helps to have an easy development life with many important technologies and open source frameworks such as JSF, Hibernate and jBPM, JBoss WS, JBoss ESB among others This is an interesting book for Java Developers who want to use open source tools for a better development, where the author knows how explain the step by step approach while using huge amounts of images throughout the book. Recall that Development process can be hard and complicated. The book is easy to understand and follow, enjoy its 408 pages For a complete review for each chapter for this book, you can follow with our friends in DZone available here JBoss Tools 3 Developers Guide

Added on: 2009-12-03

Pro Spring 2.5

Reviewer: Steve Robillard

At more than 850 pages (without the index) this book definitely bucks the current trend towards shorter, more specialized computer books. This is the result of the authors’ goal of providing more than a cursory overview of the Spring framework; a goal they clearly achieved In almost every section or chapter the authors presented multiple solutions to the problem (e.g. three different data layer implementations JDBC, iBATIS and hibernate). This variety is one of the books real strengths, demonstrating that even among enterprise solutions one size doesn’t fit all. The authors not only demonstrated what was possible with each technology, but clearly explored the strengths and weaknesses of each approach. They also provided clear guidance to help the reader in picking the right solution to a particular problem (e.g. when should you favor JSP over Velocity or FreeMaker?). Initially I felt that the lack of a single unifying project, (each chapter instead contains a standal [...]

Added on: 2009-11-12

Foundations of AOP for J2EE Development

Reviewer: Cristina Ghita

Foundations of AOP is an introduction in the new programming paradigm “Aspect Oriented Programming” that resolves OOP issues like crosscutting functionalities and code scattering. The first chapter, Introduction AOP, is a very good chapter for understanding the concepts of AOP. The crosscutting and the case of code scattering presented, are pointed as limitation of OOP. Second chapter, The Concepts of AOP presents (how the title says) the concepts of AOP. Explains what is an aspect, an aspect weaver, joinpoint, poincut, advice code and introduction. For me this chapter it was very illuminating. I work with an open source project, and sometimes, I need to make some modifications that cannot affect the core code. And without understanding well the concepts of AOP, I cannot complete this. Next 4 chapters put in action the principles of AOP through examples. The reader gets in touch with concepts of AOP through AspectJ, JAC(Java Aspect Components), JBoss AOP and Spri [...]

Added on: 2009-11-03

Grails 1.1 Web Application Development

Reviewer: Erik Weibust

Let me start by saying this review is going to be from a different perspective than what you normally get in GroovyMag. I’m not a Groovy/Grails expert. I’m a beginner. Total newbie. I’ve been writing Java/Java EE code for 10 years, but I’m brand new to Groovy/Grails. I’ve seen a few presentations at a No Fluff Just Stuff show in Dallas, TX, and a couple talks at my local Java Users Group, JavaMUG. However, doing this book review is my first take at “learning” Grails. Now that you know where I’m coming from, this will be a review of Grails 1.1 Web Application Development written by Jon Dickinson and published by Packt Publishing. This book gets straight to the point and wastes no space with boring JavaDoc, or XML Schema reference documentation. It’s a dense 310 page quick read. Grails 1.1 Web Application Development is NOT a reference manual. It’s not a book you will keep by your desk to thumb through looking for countless answers. What is it? It’s a great Grails tutorial. [...]

Added on: 2009-10-27

Spring Web Flow 2 Web Development

Reviewer: Erik Weibust

I was approached by one of the editors at Packt Publishing about doing a review of Spring Web Flow 2 Web Development. I obviously said yes, the title of this post *is* "Review of Spring Web Flow 2 Web Development" :) Plus, I really don't have much experience with Spring Web Flow 2 (SWF2) and felt doing the review made perfect sense. For those of you that appreciate my short, don't-hold-back, opinions, I'll start there: Spring Web Flow 2 Web Development is both a great "getting started" book for people wanting to learn SWF2 and serves as a good high-level "getting started" with web programming using Spring / Java EE. Definitely worth the time and money. Now my detailed review: Again, I really liked how Spring Web Flow 2 Web Development serves as both a jump-start on SWF2 and also covers technologies outside of SWF (Spring Security, build tools, Apache Tiles, etc). The book isn't a detailed reference manual, that leaves you feeling you still don't know how to us [...]

Added on: 2009-10-27

Modular Java

Reviewer: Erik Weibust

Craig Walls does a great job making the case for modular Java development with OSGi. He covers why we need to start thinking about more than just how we design our methods / classes and focus more on how we design reusable Java modules. First, Craig makes the case for modular design. Then he talks about how OSGi enables us to write modular Java applications. He covers both the Apache Felix and Eclipse Equinox OSGi containers. Next you are writing and deploying a HelloWorld OSGi service. And that's all done in the first two chapters! Craig spends the rest of the book covering modular Java and OSGi concepts through the development of an example project, Dude Where's my JAR. You also throughly learn an invaluable tool for OSGi development, Pax Construct. You learn about and writing and deploying OSGi bundles, then writing, deploying and consuming OSGi services. Once you think you know everything about OSGi, and might be thinking that it's a bit complicated, Craig bri [...]

Added on: 2009-10-27

Seam in Action

Reviewer: Benjamin Muschko

Dan starts the book with chapter one as a very good introduction to the current problems with the JSF framework. It describes why Seam is needed as a complement to JSF to build real world applications. Throughout the book, the author uses examples and source code that are easy to follow. One example is the AJAX chapter where he picks typical use cases in modern web applications (asynchronous auto completion and form validation). The book teaches JBoss Seam step by step. It starts with an introduction to seam-gen, the code generation tool packaged with Seam, to easily create your own application in less than two hours. I really liked the discussion of development IDEs that you can use to develop Seam projects and when to use one or the other in favor of a specific feature. The book discusses all aspects that were introduced with Seam. Especially when it comes to new concepts like bijection, Dan provides clear explanations and makes good use of relevant examples. Today’s [...]

Added on: 2009-10-19

Mule in Action

Reviewer: Rick Wagner

Do you write applications that have to move data around? Do you wish you could easily integrate your POJOs with email, JMS, web services, and other 'connecting' technologies? If so, this book might be of interest to you. Mule is a very popular ESB (enterpise service bus) that lets your plain Java classes share data, participate in distributing computing configurations, and shuffle data back and forth with external configurations rather than internal code changes. In other words, you write your classes without any worry about how you get data to or from the class, then you declare how they should interact with easy-to-change configuration files. Neat. The book does a great job of describing how Mule works, how you can use it, and even how to tune, secure and maintain your application after it's moved to production. Not every tech book covers the whole ownership cycle as thoroughly as this one does, it's great to have a book that covers these topics. I [...]

Added on: 2009-10-18

Open Source SOA

Reviewer: Rick Wagner

The book "Open Source SOA" by Jeff Davis is a great book for anyone seeking an understanding of Service Oriented Architecture. SOA is a conglomeration of several fast moving technologies. This book does a great job of explaining each of the sub-domains in the topic, then offers suggested implementations for each domain. I think this is a good approach-- the overview offers insights that will hold true for a long time, while the tactical sections offer actionable advice that can help the reader configure something useful today. The high level topics covered include Business Process Management, Enterprise Decision Management, Enterprise Service Bus, Event Stream Processing, Java Message Service, Registry, Service Components, and Web Service Mediation. The reader is treated to understandable explanations of the use of each of these sub-applications and how they inter-relate. On the tactical front, the author provides usable examples of each of these topic [...]

Added on: 2009-10-18

Grails in Action

Reviewer: Gary Coates

I haven't read many Java, Groovy or Grails books but I have read this one and Beginning Groovy and Grails (BGG). My full time job is a .NET developer However after reading BGG and then this book I have to say I wish I cold turn the clock back and start with this book. BGG was pretty good and I learned from it. Grails in Action is smooth, easy to read, structured well and you just want to keep reading and learning more about Grails and the more you read the more you want to keep going. The examples are simple to understand and provide just what you need to see when you are planning an application to develop. I will keep this book as I develop my skills in Grails and refer to it when needed. A must have for any Grails developer.

Added on: 2009-10-15

Spring in Practice

Reviewer: Craig Wickesser

The authors are targeting developers using the Spring Framework who want to learn more about certain topics, developers who want to catch up with some of the new features in Spring 3, or developers just getting started with Spring. Personally, I fall into the second category. I've been writing software for a little over 6 years using languages such as Java, Python, .NET and Flex. With each of my experiences I've made use of numerous frameworks and libraries including Spring .NET, but most notably the Spring Framework for Java. As a developer I have read many technical books, many of which left me feeling like I wanted something else. Typically, I found those books ended up being either very introductory or overly detailed, essentially acting as reference manuals printed on paper. I've also picked up new languages and frameworks by example, and so I prefer books that follow that mantra. Spring in Practice evolves around web application development since the authors are w [...]

Added on: 2009-10-13