Rating: 
Summary: Reveals Java as a platform for heavy-duty network programs
Review: "Java Network Programming" helps you push the envelope in the developing world of Java programming--to go far beyond the cute web page animations that are the extent of many first-generation Java applications, and get deep into Java's
capabilities as a platform for serious network programming.
The first three chapters of "Java Network Programming" provide a general
background in network and Web fundamentals. The remaining chapters
discuss Java's network classes in detail including URLs, InetAddresses, Sockets, ServerSockets, DatagramSocket,
DatagramPacket, MulticastSocket, ContentHandler, URLConnection,
URLStreamHandler and more. "Java Network Programming" also
includes dozens of complete Java programs that take advantage of the
Internet.
"Java Network Programming" is a complete guide to writing sophisticated
network applications, including many kinds of clients and servers. It
pays special attention to content and protocol handlers, a unique and
still largely unexplored area of Java's network facilities. The book
covers Java 1.0.2 and Java 1.1 additions in areas such as
socket classes, multicasting, and Remote Method Invocation (RMI).
Manning Publications has also recently published a book titled Java Network
Programming. It's not a bad book, and is surprisingly orthogonal to mine.
About 2/3 of that book is streams and encryption which I only touch on. My
book covers servlets, applets, RMI, multicast sockets, and Java 1.1 which
that book doesn't discuss. The matching titles appear to be just unlucky
choices. Both publishers went with the most obvious title they could think
of. However the cover of the Manning book has a big fish, and looks
suspiciously like an O'Reilly book. Don't be fooled. The real O'Reilly book
has a gyroscope on the cover.
Rating: 
Summary: Misapprehensions and misinformation. Avoid.
Review: Avoid. This book appears to have quite a reputation, but despite being in its 2nd edition, it is riddled with errors. The book exhibits some fundamental misapprehensions about TCP/IP; as a result it perpetrates some astonishing misinformation, much of it quite basic. Partial list: the nature of a socket close operation; what IOException when closing a socket means; what happens when the listen backlog is exceeded; specification of the ServerSocket constructors; Nagle's algorithm (Socket.setTcpNoDelay); linger; keepalive; etc etc.Of the examples which do work, the PortScanner and LocalPortScanner are provided in versions which perpetrate atrocities on the local machine and network by not closing sockets. Multi-homing very cursorily treated, not even indexed. Firewalls apparently treated in one page. Role of TTL in multicast apparently ignored. The text is verbose and repetitive, and a number of the examples are irrelevant. Fully 50% of the Sockets for Servers chapter consists of a rather irrelevant excursion into HTTP and HTML; the examples have bugs, not that they have much point. Also, what pray have HTML rendering and parsing in Swing got to do with networking? 30 irrelevant pages on this; nice to have, but why here? Author seems to think HotSpot is a JIT. Typos in the index, not encouraging. Many impending JDK 1.4 enhancements will shortly obsolete this book. Avoid it. For TCP/IP and UDP fundamentals, buy W.R. Stevens Unix Network Programming. -
Rating:
Summary: Total waste of time and paper
Review: Contains examples that fail to work. Also the explanations are SO BAD they don't help at all. The API docs contain more information than this ever will. I'd love to like it, but so there. Go for more general books instead.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Book - a must have for serious Java programmer
Review: From the basics, throught Multicasting, RMI, and Servlets. Goes into great depths on all topics, TCP/UDP, datagrams, URLs, sockets, you name it..
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful book, easy and fun to read
Review: Good, but not great. Before I read this book I had no clue on how to write a network program. This book does an excellent job of taking you from knowing nothing to being ready to take a crack at it. Contains two great chapters on i/o and threads that you will need. However, I thought that it left some obvious questions unanswered. I had the search the net to fill in the gaps. For example, I want to write a telnet enabled application but the book left me in the dark as to when to get the tools to construct one (doing it from scratch is a big waste of time). BTW the tools aren't in the JDK exactly but are available (for free) elsewhere, kindaof like the RE packages are.
Rating: 
Summary: Good
Review: Good, but not great. Before I read this book I had no clue on how to write a network program. This book does an excellent job of taking you from knowing nothing to being ready to take a crack at it. Contains two great chapters on i/o and threads that you will need. However, I thought that it left some obvious questions unanswered. I had the search the net to fill in the gaps. For example, I want to write a telnet enabled application but the book left me in the dark as to when to get the tools to construct one (doing it from scratch is a big waste of time). BTW the tools aren't in the JDK exactly but are available (for free) elsewhere, kindaof like the RE packages are.
Rating:
Summary: Good intro to Java network programming
Review: I had a couple years experience with Java, but knew nothing about network programming. I bought this book, and started writing fairly sophisticated network code (chat rooms, online games, web browsing software, etc.) by the time I was halfway through. I wouldn't recommend this book to Java beginners, but I would definitely recommend it to more experienced Java coders who are new to network programming. Since some readers have complained that this book is out of date, I would remind everyone that a new edition is due out in August of 2000. Don't be swayed by anyone who rates this book solely on the basis that it is outdated; just hold out for the second edition.
Rating:
Summary: Great Intro to Networking with Java
Review: I love this book. Absolutely love it. One of the great things here is the tie in of network programming with java's IO classes. Networking in Java is IO, and this book explains it upfront. The overviews of IO and Threading in the first couple of chapters can really solidify these topics if you are sketchy on them. The rest of the book is dedicated to going over the .net classes & explaining each one, providing in depth/useful examples for each. The appendix of the book give a good enough overview of RMI & JavaMail, more than enough to get you going using either package. While this is not a book for total beginners, if you need to learn the .net package, or want to take your Java skills to the network, buy this book!
Rating:
Summary: An Excellent Choice
Review: I read this book and really enjoyed it. It is easy to read, and has lots of useful code. I like all books written by this author. If you like this book, then you should try his book on JAVA and XML. That book is well written. I would recommend this networking book to anyone who wants to learn JAVA and Networking. Some LAN experience or a networking course will help you. Buy this book -- it is worth an investment!!!
Rating:
Summary: An Excellent Choice
Review: I read this book and really enjoyed it. It is easy to read, and has lots of useful code. I like all books written by this author. If you like this book, then you should try his book on JAVA and XML. That book is well written. I would recommend this networking book to anyone who wants to learn JAVA and Networking. Some LAN experience or a networking course will help you. Buy this book -- it is worth an investment!!!
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