Rating: 
Summary: Unorganized, repetitive, and incomplete -- DON'T BUY!
Review: Unless this book is required for a class you're taking, don't waste your money. I am no writing or programming expert, but I do have multiple technical graduate degrees, and I spent 8 years designing curriculum (like training manuals) for astronuats' training for NASA. And I cannot understand why this book is so popular --- it must be the only Java textbook out there. With its lack of logical sequence, its unnecessary repitition, and its omission of important topics, it is neither a good learning tool for the beginner nor a good reference source for the seasoned programmer (sadly, this assessment also applies to the authors' C++ textbook, which I promptly returned for a refund at the end of the course). Several times, the authors repeat themselves almost word for word on the same page, or on several pages throughout the text. And while everything in a subject as rich as Java cannot be covered in one textbook, important and commonly used things like the Calendar class (used to set time and date information) are apparently never mentioned in the book (in the C++ book a simple table of all the mathemetical functions in the ANSI C standard is missing). But the most glaring and annoying problem is the authors' REPEATED inclusion of topics in their examples that they have not yet explained or even introduced. Time and time again, a new and foreign function or statement is included in an example program when it doesn't have to be. Each of these errors only leaves the reader confused and wondering whether they missed something in prior reading or its explanation is forthcoming. Its effect is to detract from the topic currently being examined, and to make the book so haphazardly arranged that it is a nightmare to try to use a reference later ("WHERE was that again?"); even the exlanation for something as simple and obvious as the "String args{}" in the "main" method header is buried in a paragraph in a chapter deep into the book. Look elsewhere for a good Java book. I will.
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Summary: rrg@solomon.cs.qc.edu
Review: As the person who was in charge for implementing the switch from Pascal to Java, I would like to personally thank the Deitels for their erudite scholarship and writing. Their book and multimedia package in my mind (this review is personal opinion and cannot be construed as an official opinion of department, school nor university) is the solution to the problem of the Java language training. I can personally attest to individual students who told me that their grades improved from a C to a B because they listened to my advice and reviewed lectures using the multimedia CD-rom. I was amazed at how EVERYONE that I saw brought their book to class and we had a lecture hall of 164 students (times three!). Java appears daunting to many at first but with Deitel & Deitel in the classroom, everything becomes manageable.
Rating:
Summary: great java book
Review: This book is great for all programmers, and especially for beginners. I just use it as a reference and I liked the examples in it. I found Chapter 8 and 9 very helpful to relate the OOP thinking to Java. chapter19(servlets) and chapter25(java beans) are well cleared with good examples You will find all what you about java.
Rating:
Summary: Not the best Java book out there
Review: It is very unfair for me to give this book only 2 stars, but it is necessary. I bought this book for a class I took in college to learn Java, but I found it difficult to read and understand. The book would be great for a beginner, but not for a beginner programmer. It uses language that only programmer understand, if you are new to programming I'd go with another book that uses plain English instead of Programmer talk. The book is full of examples is the only thing that made me give this book an extra star, if it hadn't then this book would have only get one star, if that, but it doesn't even make a good reference book. Although it has great examples, I think that they are using examples that may be too advanced for a beginner. To use the analogy of a child leaning to crawl before they walk and then learning to run and jump, this book tries to by pass the whole crawling and walking part and tries to get you to run and jump. It uses too many examples and instead of explaining them right away they expect you to just live with them and have faith. I didn't like that very much. If you would bother to look at the title of the book, notice that it mentions "an introduction to Swing." The book gets involved with swing right away, something they should have left for probably the middle chapters. If you want to learn Java and you are a programmer already or you are good with lengthy explanations then this book deserves a 4 star rating, but if you are not and you are trying to learn Java before learning anything else then I stick with my 2 star rating and recommend the "Teach Yourself Java in 21 Days" book. Now that is a great book that explains everything in plain English, unfortunately they don't offer too many examples, but at least you will learn something. I can't say that I learned anything with the Deitel book.
Rating: 
Summary: An excellent book to learn Java
Review: This is an excellent book to learn Java if you are a C++ programmer. It covers from the very basics to most of the advanced topics of Java technology. The examples are carefully selected and designed for easy understanding of the concepts. The first half of the book is basics which you can have a quick look. The second half covers all of the advanced topics such as GUI, Multi-Media, JDBC, Servlet, Client/Sever. All of the examples are very well explained and major concepts emphasized. Two more points I need to indicate. First, it is not a very good book for reference. If you want a reference go to Core Java. Second its binding is terrible
Rating: 
Summary: Not sure why everyone thinks this book is so great.
Review: I bought this book hoping to learn Java. I normally program in Visual Basic and ASP, and I do a lot of DBA work in MS-SQL 7. So, I read the reviews and thought, "Man, this should be the best book in the world- ideal for beginners!" Was I wrong. The book fails to teach you the basics like how to use the compilers, editors, register the classes/plug-ins. So, your code bombs over and over with errors like "Fatal Error (06): Class Welcome is not defined." And this is when trying to do the first 'simple' example which is supposed to print "Welcome to Java Programming!" on your screen. The book spends a whole chapter explaining to you what a computer is, and what it does. If it is so 'basic' that it includes 40+ pages on this topic, I would think the book would explain how to install, configure and set-up the compilers/editors. But it doesn't. Chapter 1 is "What's a computer?", Chapter 2 is "Writing simple Java Code". Man, talk about a jump! To me, a good example of a 'beginner level' book are the books by John Smiley (for VB). That's how I started learning VB- he writes in a very comprehendable manner, whereas the Deitel's appear to like using $10 words. For example, here's a quote from the book (Chapter 3, Introduction to Java Applets) "The function components of a class are called methods (some object-oriented programming languages call them member functions). Just as an instance of a built-in (primitive) type such as int is called a variable, an instance of a user-defined type (i.e., a class) is called an object (or instance)." WHAT? Read that a few times. This is how the entire book is written. I can think of a hundred different ways to say the same thing in a more simple manner. Jesus, this book is terrible. Does it have examples? Yes, there's hundreds of examples. Can you get them to work without knowing anything about Java? No. Not easily. If I were shelling out [money] again, I'd spend it on 2 or 3 other books instead of this....
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Summary: wonderful series How to Program
Review: I felt obliged to thank Dr. Harvey M. Deitel, and all Deitel's authors for their wonderful series How to Program. As a professor in Concordia University and Delta College in Montreal, Canada, I recommend the series How to Program (C, C++, Visual Basic, Java, and Internet and World Wide Web). This series gives a wealth of information in a well and manageable format, with many challenging exercises and examples too. Congratulations on an outstanding piece of work, and thank you Dr. Khattar Daou Professor, M.S., Ph.D. Concordia University, Computer Institute
Rating:
Summary: Only for beginners. (Really beginners)
Review: I do not recommend this book unless you are really, really new to programming. It expends too much space explaining basic things and too litle space explaining what is truly Java and OOP. There are explanations that come too late in the text and for instance you understand some things in chapter 4 that should be explained in chapter 1.
Rating: 
Summary: The book falls apart. The binding sucks.
Review: This book is a great book for Learning Java. It is full of great examples that can be used to pick up Java concepts easily. However my book is falling apart -- other books that I own from wrox and o'reilly don't fall apart. I program in Java by looking at examples which means I flip through the book extensivly. For 68 bucks this book should stay together. If you want to learn Java concepts then buy this book -- but keep a roll of tape handy because you are going to need it.
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Summary: What a great find!
Review: I have found the book Java How To Program to be one of the best foundation building books I have ever read. I have been in the computer industry for almost ten years and I have yet to find a book that does such a good job of taking a novice by the hand and turning them into an intermediate programmer. It is an invaluable reference and VERY well organized. I would recommend this book to anyone who is needing to start learning Java or already has a good understanding, but needs a more solid foundation or just wants a wonderful reference book!
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