Rating: 
Summary: Excellent
Review: Even if you had never programmed a line of code before this book could you! But if you are an experienced programmer and would like to learn JAVA I would highly recommend this publication. Not only do the examples teach you something that is relevant but also they build upon themselves to teach solid programming techniques. The book has many comments (specially marked) showing good, poor and common programming practices (with a spin for JAVA). You will find them repeated occasionally. The book makes it easy to understand subjects like: Polymorphism, Inheritance and Threading. Best of all, most of the examples are based on SWING (a very cool new GUI layer from SUN.) You even start using SWING even before they cover it specifically in the book! You cannot go wrong.
Rating:
Summary: The Devil is in the Details
Review: I took a course in C programming that used the D+D book for the text. I found that the book was mind-numbingly thorough and succinct. Well, my current Java course uses a textbook by Lewis and Loftus, but I use the D+D Java book to reference everything in the course, because I can find examples on every topic covered in an introductory Java course. I especially find the Swing coverage useful, because so many texts, including the Lewis and Loftus book, either avoid Swing altogether or touch upon it in a topical manner. D+D are the most thorough authors that I have found, period. They have the gift of being thorough without getting overly specific in one of the many Java facets. The reason that I'm writing this review is because a couple of peers in my Java course were looking for a good reference book (for the same reason that I bought the book: Java Software Solutions, by Lewis and Loftus, leaves much to be desired in terms of depth, content, and common class coverage; they use their own Keyboard class for inputting primitives, rather than using Java's built-in functionality). I recommended the book, but two of them told me that they had read mediocre reviews on Amazon. I was able to change their minds on the book after showing the in-depth coverage provided on arrays and methods. I think that one of my classmates actually went out and bought the book that day. Interestingly, the overwhelming majority of negative reviews for this book contained spelling and grammar errors. I don't know what type of programmers bad spellers make, but I'd surmise to assume that sloppy spelling infers sloppy coding. There are several excellent grammar and spelling checkers available, including the built-in functionality available in StarOffice and Word.
Rating:
Summary: Way to go, step-by-step
Review: This book is outstanding. It is an exemplary hands-on incremental exposition of how to do things. Although I think of myself as a neat and well-organized worker, I have benefited enormously from the general tips on programming style. When George Bernard Shaw, that old cynic, said, "Those who can do, those who can't teach," he had it dead wrong. The truth of the matter is, "Those who can do, those who really can teach."
Rating:
Summary: My favorite
Review: This is not only the best book I read on Java (and I spent a fortune on other books!), it is arguably the best book on programming. I took some introductory courses in object oriented programming back at university but I never really practiced programming and therefore consider myself a beginner. Both the theoretical part as well as the rich set of sample programs helped me to get started. In short: This book is definitely worth the money.
Rating:
Summary: Heaven and Hell!
Review: This is a Bible--For a hands-on programmer. Save you tons of time to learn things. I just studied this book for 2 weeks and learnt all I want and made a online auction site by myself with JDBC and JAVA SERVLET. (Of course I have experiences in Java before and love it.) But for those begginers it could be a nightmare, since they can not get any sense from tons of examples. You could see that who rated this book low is actually READING that book not USING that book. So my opinion is: Hey, guys, get your feet wet, not only read but play with those examples, compile them, run them! I bet you would feel excellant when you go through most of the NEAT, HELPFUL, CLASSICAL examples in this book!
Rating: 
Summary: Good but too much Swing Here and There
Review: This is a good book in general. I have read 9 chapters from it already. What is good about this book is that it explains some of the important aspects of Java by using giving tips, pointing out common errors, and giving advice on how to program more efficienly. I particularly like chapters 8 and 9 of this book on objects. However, I have to warn you that these chapters are not for first-time readers. Before reading this book I have already read the object chapter in Thinking in Java. One very bad aspect about this book is that it introduces Swing right from chapter two of this chapter. I strongly believe that its presence is not only unnecessary but also tends to obscure the explanation on some very simple Java concepts. See, you end up reading an entire page of code just to learn one simple java concept which has nothing to do with Swing itself at all! Of course, if you want to familiarize yourself with swing, you will find this approach very helpful. A second failure of this book is that its printing is really bad in the sense that it kills your eyes by using too much red in the book. This is compounded by its ultra-packed fonts and little whitespace for you to take notes! The really bad chapter is chapter 17! It is far worse than the corresponding chapter on I/O in the Java tutorial that I have read at the Sun site! Let me remind you that I have read that tutorial before reading this chapter! It is just terribly messy because the bold-face code intermingles with the normal text and there are just too many bold-faced mono-spaced key words in this chapter! In sum, if you want to learn Swing and use it in your real world code, buy this book (particularly, if you want to know more about OO and some little java techniques.) If you already have another "thick" book on Java and just want to pass the certification exam, I suggest you buy a certification book with lots of questions in it. Of course, the revision questions in this book are also very good! Moreover, the exercises in this book are also very challenging.
Rating:
Summary: New programmers? READ THIS BOOK!
Review: The book is amazing and I can't wait till the Advanced How to Program and all the other books that come's later this year. Even though I lived in MN for 3 years and have an Associate of Applied Science in Multimedia Degree I think that the book is really well put together even for foreigners. I ,myself, comes from Norway. The way the book goes through every line and describes it's action is just so helpful and understanding. And at last it's not boring. I didn't feel that I was reading, but more communicating with the book. Keep up the good work.
Rating:
Summary: Java How to Program - 3rd Edition
Review: If you have read one of those introductory overviews of Java and now want to develop a firm foundation in programming in Java, this is the way to go! Written at the college freshman level, Harvey and Paul Deitel et al. have combined their knowledge of computer science based upon 20 years of teaching, hundreds of seminars and two previous editions of this text into a book that is through, comprehensive and articulate. A great book for self study. There are lots of exercises to develop and check how well you are mastering the material. Oh, and they actually respond to E-mail questions posted to the book's Web site!
Rating:
Summary: Teaches Basics of Java syntax, but not OO/general progamming
Review: I'm 1/2 way through the book. As i write my own apps i've found that the examples don't promote OO programming. Examples are explained really well, but are so simple that they won't be very useful in a real program. In some cases, way too much verbage for a very simple concept, while other areas lack any depth (you can completey skip the chapter on Graphics, it provides nothing you can't learn in 5 minutes of reading the Java2 API). Overall, it's a decent place to start, but you should fully expect to gather other resources once you're comfortable with the basics. I've already purchased a book on DS&A in Java, and will start that once i've finished the 2 chapters on GUI. I'll probably come back to D&D for quick reference, but expect i'll need more in depth books on specific topics (graphics, networking, etc.)
Rating: 
Summary: Don't bother to try it
Review: Hi, Java beginners, I know what you think when you brwosed this book, "Woo, this is what I'm looking for, cover everything with so much details! I will be a sophiscated Java programmer once I finish this book!" This is also what I think when I bought this book, now I can tell you, WE ARE WRONG! I'm better candidate to tell you how bad this book is, because this is my TEXTBOOK. You don't know how painful it is for me to go through this book. Let me share more of my experience with you. When I study OOP for chapter 8 and 9, I read book several times, but once I closed book, nothing left in my mind. Sound I'm kind of stupid, isn't it? I was also very frustrated and queston my understanding ability. But, finally I realized it's not my fault. I found a right book name A Prgrammer's Guide to Java Certification. It covers the same knowledge only at 80 pages, which is only half size of how to, but once I finished reading everything of OOP is so clear in my mind. Now I know why this book is bad. The example is too long. Instead of let you grad the basic idea at first, those example start to implement some fancy GUI design which makes you totally lost. Now I never use this book for my course. Whenever I saw those painful expressions of my classmates in library when they are reading the book, I feel I'm lucky to dump it. And it's book is EXPENSIVE! you're lucky if you trust me. Edward ewang@tamu.edu
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