Book Club

One item I think would have improved this book is if the authors reinforced the use of JavaDoc note style for their comments. While definitely a minor point, I believe the target audience of the book (beginning Computer Science majors) would benefit more from this style of documentation than what is presented in the book. I also felt that the inclusion of a graphics portion in each chapter would have been better served in their own chapters. While psychologically more pleasing for students to actually have something to show others (beyond the command line), these offerings tended not to reinforce the chapter concepts any more than the programs presented in the rest of the chapter. I think the authors realized this fact and the pages for these GUI portions of each chapter have a border on them to be easily distinguished from the rest of the book.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone wishing to learn Java at an entry level. Java Software Solutions also does a good job in comparing Java to other languages (namely C++) to help the transition to Java for those institutions that are moving to that language.

Review by: Wayne Graham
November 7, 2003