Rating: 
Summary: Sub Par Book.
Review: This starts off as a decent enough book but quickly goes down hill. First problem, this book doesn't even mention File I/O (java.io.*) which is covered on the exam. Second problem, the testing software is bad. Really really Bad. Frequently the questions display incorrectly. They are also sometimes graded wrong. Making you seriously question what you know. I ended up spending several days trying to unlearn some of the info I "learned" from the testing software. For the most part though. it is an okay book. The parts that it does manage to cover are covered relatively thoroughly. Don't plan on keeping this as a reference book. This really is just for reviewing for the exam. It wouldn't be a bad idea to keep the reciept and return it when you are done. Better yet, don't bother buying it. If you are already an active Java programmer just use your API reference or whatever to review. I only bought this book because it had been over a year since I have done java work. I hope this review is helpful for someone. If you do need a book try one from Sybex, ISBN=0782128254.
Rating: 
Summary: I passed in spite of this book.
Review: This book is awful. The sample questions contain tons of errors. The included software is detrimental to your success. This book doesn't even contain a section on File I/O which is on the test. The section on threads may be the worst explanation of threads I've ever seen.I ended up studying in a bookstore with their copy of the Sybex Java Cert. book, while it contained errors as well, it seems that the authors actually know something about the test. To be fair the section on Garbage Collection is great. It contains one of the best explanations of weak references and phantom references that I've seen. The only problem is that these topics are not covered by the test.
Rating: 
Summary: Ok not sufficient for the Test
Review: Its good for a start. It has few good chapters like the Garbage collection and few more but not enough for the test. I had to buy one more book "The complete Java 2 Certification Study guide " by Simon Roberts and also the Java 2 Exam cram.
Rating:
Summary: Lame Book; Much better ones available
Review: I have used three books. Both of the others (Exam Cram and Roberts book) are better. There are lots of errors in this book. Not just typos. And there is no errata listed. And neither the technical editor or one of the authors responded to me when I e-mailed to ask about it. And the practice questions that it referes to are just the chapter questions again.
Rating:
Summary: Good but not the best & some suprising problems
Review: I liked the book because of the sample exam on the CD, however after taking the test on the CD found it was fairly annoying and had many errors. The worst thing about the online test was that the code is NOT aligned. So when you take the test you have to visualize indentation and what the question really asks. This is particularly annoying on some of the questions with 50 lines of code (way more than you'll see on the real exam!). Suprisingly, this book does not even mention the IO package which is on the test. Also, the depth of coverage on garbage collection was far too deep. I'm comparing this with two other certification books which do not even mention phantom references/ soft/hard references, etc. Interesting to know, like how to recover a deleted object - but not needed for the certification exam! Overall I think its a good book. But I would get another one too such as the one by Mughal & Rasmussen
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent guide despite errors
Review: This guide is easy to read and follow. The authors present themselves as personal tutors as they walk you through difficult topics with mimimal pain. What a pity the java.io package was left out. You must download this chapter from the publisher's site as it's one of the core objectives. The errors in the book are quite irritating but not end-of-the-world stuff. Just make sure that you download the lates Errata/corrections from publishers site and you'll be ok. I found that using this book in combination with the Java 2 Exam notes from Sybex was the best thing I could have done for myself. The two books complemented each other well. I passed the exam with a good margin by using only this guide and the Java 2 Exam notes.
Rating:
Summary: Too many mistakes... Don't waste your money.
Review: This book has simply too many mistakes to get you to Java certified. It is ironic that this book is a certification series book. It will confuse you thoroughly. If they had yanked stuff from Sun Java documentation (like some other books) that would have been still okay but a certification series book with serious technical glitches? Books like this prove that perhaps it is time to alter the the dictionary meaning of the word "Book". Sure a whole bunch of coauthors (most claim to be Sun /Certified/ Java Programmers) have something neat to write in their resumes and the publisher is going to make a lot of money off of gullible readers. I wonder how they passed the exam with such poor knowledge of the subject. Don't waste your money. There are 2 other books that you will at least find useful: "Java 2 Certification Guide" and "Java in a Nutshell". Better to do without books than to believe everything they say -- Chinese proverb.
Rating: 
Summary: Very good
Review: This book is a lot better than I thought. I joined a cource to prepare for the scjp exam and the Academy's prefered book was this one. Don't let the print errors scare you - it's easy to correct. The text is very well written with easy-to-understand-examples. The IO chapter is easy to get too. Every chapter have 20 improved questions with good explanations.
Rating:
Summary: Confusing details about Java
Review: I second all those critical of this book. Here is an example of a paragraph that left me more confused than when I started: Page 366, Chapter 12: The java.util Package Iterator Methods A simple explanation of an iterator is an object that contains methods that allow a programmer to iterate through the data one element at a time. The iterator() method returns an Iterator object from the collection. The methods in the Iterator interface follow. Iterator iterator() This returns true if the iteration has more elements: boolean hasNext() ... ------------- End of quote ------- Not that the explanation was inaccurate. It is just difficult to follow.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent book if somewhat new to Java
Review: I wanted to get certified but wasn't sure how to go about preparing for the exam. When I saw this book in the bookstore I really got exceited. It was exactly what I needed. After the first few chapters I noticed a few errors, so I went to the website and sure enough there was an errata sheet. I corrected the errors and then flew through the rest of the book. It seems like it was really written for someone who has been working with Java for under 2 years or so, which was perfect for me. It explains things carefully, as opposed to Core Java 2 which I found really difficult to read through. Bottom line: I passed the test with a high mark. This was the only book I needed. Without the errata sheet this is a 3 star book, with all errors corrected it is a 5 star book, so I'll give it 4 stars.
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