JDBC API Tutorial and Reference, Third Edition

Rating:
Summary: Mature and stable
Review: Almost all practical commercial deployments of Java involve hooking to a back end database. Of the latter, relational databases are the dominant form. The first version of JDBC arose soon after Java was released, because of this compelling need. Since then, Sun has extended the functionality while still striving to keep its learning curve shallow, as compared to Microsoft's ODBC. Indeed, the latest Java 1.4 Standard Edition includes JDBC 3.0 in its entirety.

To document JDBC 3.0, Sun has put out the third edition of this book. The maturity of JDBC is reflected in its heft. The reference portion is voluminous. The tutorial section is like aged whisky; it goes down smoothly. Sun has had plenty of time to sandpaper rough edges and, based on user feedback, to add popularly requested capabilities.

The attraction of this book is that it describes a mature and stable product. In corporate terms, it is safe and conservative. In other words, you can develop with JDBC according to the book and be highly confident of success. At least insofar as your Java GUI conversing with the database. (The design of a GUI or a database is outside the purview of the book.)

Rating:
Summary: the best JDBC book
Review: If you are an experienced or intermediate programmer this is the only book you will need. Almost every bit of the JDBC is explaind. The API in the second part of the book is also very good, it is filled with explanations that the javadoc lacks.

Rating:
Summary: an exceptionally comprehensive volume
Review: JDBC is one of the most mature and widely used Java APIs. Even after the arrival of more recent tools and technologies like EJB's CMP and JDO, JDBC still remains a simple, fast, and reliable way of storing objects' state in an RDBMS. While conceptually this technology is quite straightforward, its evolution has made it more complex and voluminous. Many books have been trying to explain the main aspects of it over and over again, but the 3rd edition of "JDBC API Tutorial and Reference" goes far beyond that.

The book is divided into two major sections: the Tutorial and the Reference. Actually, there are four tutorials in the Part One: Basic, Advanced, MetaData, and Rowset. Here well-written explanations are followed by clear and detailed examples.

It is remarkable that Part Two, The Reference, is not your typical API reference with simply method signatures or redundant explanations of their arguments. This is an extremely well thought through description of how to use JDBC 3.0 API to achieve a particular goal. Every class has a solid overview, examples, schemas -- everything one needs to get the job done. The book also contains an Appendix for JDBC driver developers and another Appendix covering JDBC 3.0 API changes.

This book provides the most clear and comprehensive JDBC coverage that I have ever seen. It is not just a matter of its size of over 1200 pages, but although the result of a well designed book structure and clear delivery.

Rating:
Summary: A Must For Your Bookshelf!
Review: What can I say... if you do JDBC programming, you must have this book in your bookshelf. Great examples and super coverage of a very wide topic. You'll read it and continue to look back at it. Well worth the money!

Rating:
Summary: The only JDBC book you will need
Review: Whether you are a beginner, intermediate, or advanced JDBC programmer you will find useful information in this book. The book is divided into two sections. The first section is a tutorial on using JDBC which makes up four chapters. The tutorial starts with a look at JDBC 1.0. The next chapter looks at the additional features added to JDBC in 2.0 and 3.0. The third tutorial chapter looks at metadata. The final chapter examines the RowSet interface, which is complex enough to need its own chapter.

The remainder of the book (about 800 pages) is a reference containing a chapter for each class or interface in JDBC. Each chapter contains an overview of a class or interface, sections on anything of either special interest or complexity, and then a list of all the methods of the class or interface with complete descriptions. If a section applies to a particular version of JDBC, the version it applies to is clearly marked. The information contained in the reference is much more than you can find in the APIs. The reference section itself is well laid out to make the information you need easy to find.

This is probably the only JDBC book you will ever need. No matter which version of JDBC your database drivers support, you will find your answers in this book. The book is well written with clear explanations and plenty of code samples (which can be downloaded from the Sun web site) . Anyone working with JDBC will want this book by their side while they are coding.

Rating:
Summary: The only JDBC book you will need
Review: Whether you are a beginner, intermediate, or advanced JDBC programmer you will find useful information in this book. The book is divided into two sections. The first section is a tutorial on using JDBC which makes up four chapters. The tutorial starts with a look at JDBC 1.0. The next chapter looks at the additional features added to JDBC in 2.0 and 3.0. The third tutorial chapter looks at metadata. The final chapter examines the RowSet interface, which is complex enough to need its own chapter.

The remainder of the book (about 800 pages) is a reference containing a chapter for each class or interface in JDBC. Each chapter contains an overview of a class or interface, sections on anything of either special interest or complexity, and then a list of all the methods of the class or interface with complete descriptions. If a section applies to a particular version of JDBC, the version it applies to is clearly marked. The information contained in the reference is much more than you can find in the APIs. The reference section itself is well laid out to make the information you need easy to find.

This is probably the only JDBC book you will ever need. No matter which version of JDBC your database drivers support, you will find your answers in this book. The book is well written with clear explanations and plenty of code samples (which can be downloaded from the Sun web site) . Anyone working with JDBC will want this book by their side while they are coding.