Rating:  Summary: Good sorta... Review: In the chapter I was most interested in Chp 17 Developing Database Access Components the author continues to use his custom classes instead of giving the theories and supporting examples so you can write your own. I had no problem sifting through the authors code but it just seems plain lazy. Overall though I found the book useful as it contained more useful examples than previous JSP books I've purchased.
Rating:  Summary: Hmm.. middle of the road Review: Keep looking. This one just isn't enough.
Rating:  Summary: Worthwhile new edition Review: Many new editions of technical books I have purchased have not entirely been worth the purchase price. Usually the updated material is limited in scope or fairly light. The new edition of this book is definitely worth it. Much of the custom ora tag examples have been replaced with the tags from the new Java Standard Tag Library. Though the ora tags are still used here and there, one has to remember that the section that uses them is targeted at non-Java programmers. Even so, the custom tags he does introduce early on are for pretty specific cases and usually aren't core to the point the example is trying to illustrate.Han's grasp of the technology is superb as is his vision of how best to utilize it, though I would prefer to see a little more substantiation of some of those views, like a more compelling case for why scriptlets are bad. Personally, I don't find that as much of a detraction as I subscribe to the same design philosophy when it comes to JSP. I just want a third part reference to throw at my teammates when thet write JSPs that I consider bad. I would have loved to see some teasers from the JSP 2.0 spec, but I think for the general audience it was a wise decision to leave any such out, as they would have just clouded the wealth of features already available in the 1.2 spec. Overall, I consider this book, especially this edition, an absolute must have in my professional bookshelf.
Rating:  Summary: Not very good way to learn JSP! Review: Not a very good book to learn JavaServer Pages from. Too much emphasis on JavaBean development and Tag library creation. A good JavaServer pages book will stress teaching JSP and Java Servlets creation. Also, didn't care for the examples or writing style. May I recommend either: Core Servlets and JavaServer Pages (JSP) by Marty Hall and/or Java Server Pages Application Development by Ben Forta,
Rating:  Summary: Poorly edited Review: One problem I have with O'Reilly books is that the authors seem to have no sense of how to frame explanations for beginners. They characterize a book or chapter of a book as being aimed at beginners, then assume knowledge only an experienced person would have. I bought this book simply because it was recently published and I wanted an explanation of the new "Expression Language" and other new JSP features. I haven't worked my way through it completely yet, but so far I'm amazed at the number of typos and gramatical mistakes.
Rating:  Summary: An essential reference text... Review: Review So, you're surfing a web site and hit a web page that ends with the extension .jsp. Looks like a regular web page to you, and if you view the source, it still looks like regular HTML. So what is a .jsp page, anyway? This book will tell you everything you need to know, both as to what they are, how they work, and how you can start using the technology in your development projects. Provided you have a basic understanding of Java, this book will work well for you. The book starts off with an explanation of what JSPs are and why you would use them. Basically, it provides a way to generate dynamic web pages using snippets of Java code. Logically, it's much like ActiveServer Pages (ASP) code as provided by Microsoft, only using Java instead of Visual Basic. It then goes into the benefits of generating content in this fashion, and how it's a superior method to other technologies such as CGI and ASP coding. The rest of the book then goes into great detail (with a large number of examples) on the specifics of JSP syntax. The author does an excellent job of meshing the approach of a tutorial with actual detail that can be referenced after you start developing applications. The author assumes the use of the Tomcat J2EE server package to learn JSP technology. Tomcat is a free download from www.apache.org, and it's easy to load and configure. But don't dispair if you are using a different web server. The examples are very generic and portable, and with very little effort you can adapt the information to whatever platform you use. In my case, I was using the Websphere platform and had no problems using that server to work my way through the book. Ok... You're a Notes/Domino developer who is wondering why you should care about this stuff. It's not Notes, and you don't know Java, so why bother? Well, there is a whole area of Domino development now codenamed "NextGen" that will allow you to access Domino data and application components within a J2EE environment. Much of this new approach to developing applications based on Domino will involve the use of servlets for business logic and JavaServer Pages to display the traditional forms and views. Furthermore, Domino 6 provides custom tag libraries that do much of the "Notes-y" stuff for you when you are working with JSPs. In order to start moving in this direction with Domino, you'll need to start learning about JSP technology, and this book will start you in that direction. And if you are thinking about working with portals, you HAVE to learn this stuff. Portlets are nothing more than an extension of servlet classes and JSPs to display the data. Conclusion If you want to keep moving along in the IBM/Lotus world, servlet and JSP technologies are in your future. While you may not need it right now, you WILL need it. I highly recommend this book as a great starter text on the subject that will grow with you as you learn and work with JSPs.
Rating:  Summary: An essential reference text... Review: Review So, you're surfing a web site and hit a web page that ends with the extension .jsp. Looks like a regular web page to you, and if you view the source, it still looks like regular HTML. So what is a .jsp page, anyway? This book will tell you everything you need to know, both as to what they are, how they work, and how you can start using the technology in your development projects. Provided you have a basic understanding of Java, this book will work well for you. The book starts off with an explanation of what JSPs are and why you would use them. Basically, it provides a way to generate dynamic web pages using snippets of Java code. Logically, it's much like ActiveServer Pages (ASP) code as provided by Microsoft, only using Java instead of Visual Basic. It then goes into the benefits of generating content in this fashion, and how it's a superior method to other technologies such as CGI and ASP coding. The rest of the book then goes into great detail (with a large number of examples) on the specifics of JSP syntax. The author does an excellent job of meshing the approach of a tutorial with actual detail that can be referenced after you start developing applications. The author assumes the use of the Tomcat J2EE server package to learn JSP technology. Tomcat is a free download from www.apache.org, and it's easy to load and configure. But don't dispair if you are using a different web server. The examples are very generic and portable, and with very little effort you can adapt the information to whatever platform you use. In my case, I was using the Websphere platform and had no problems using that server to work my way through the book. Ok... You're a Notes/Domino developer who is wondering why you should care about this stuff. It's not Notes, and you don't know Java, so why bother? Well, there is a whole area of Domino development now codenamed "NextGen" that will allow you to access Domino data and application components within a J2EE environment. Much of this new approach to developing applications based on Domino will involve the use of servlets for business logic and JavaServer Pages to display the traditional forms and views. Furthermore, Domino 6 provides custom tag libraries that do much of the "Notes-y" stuff for you when you are working with JSPs. In order to start moving in this direction with Domino, you'll need to start learning about JSP technology, and this book will start you in that direction. And if you are thinking about working with portals, you HAVE to learn this stuff. Portlets are nothing more than an extension of servlet classes and JSPs to display the data. Conclusion If you want to keep moving along in the IBM/Lotus world, servlet and JSP technologies are in your future. While you may not need it right now, you WILL need it. I highly recommend this book as a great starter text on the subject that will grow with you as you learn and work with JSPs.
Rating:  Summary: Disappointed. 2.5 stars. Review: Scattered throughout this book is some good introductory, conceptual material. Most the actual development advice is missing. You have to wrangle with the author's custom "O'Reilly" classes at every turn rather than dealing directly with Sun Java JSP. The book also can't decide what it wants to be. The beginning is shallow (at least for developers) and is probably better suited for Web designers. Wish I could rate this 2.5 stars, but it's O'Reilly so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and make it 3. Still very disappointed though.
Rating:  Summary: A Great book on JSP at a very affordable price Review: The author did a great job of covering all aspects of JSPs starting from simple examples and leading the reader to complex examples involving custom tags and Database access. The book contains an excellent discussion on Model-View-Controller architecture as well as the scenarios where the power of JSPs could be harnessed with servlets and with JavaBeans. A must have for any professional developer who wishes to understand JSPs and write good quality code for their project. As one of the reviews mentioned, this is not a "cookbook" useful for churning out something in a couple of weeks for somebody who is new to JSPs and do not care to learn what their code is capable of doing.
Rating:  Summary: A complete primer to JSP technology Review: This a primer that describes the background JSP and server side programming in Java, as well it is a rather good tutorial for developing JSP. The JSP technology is based on the servlet technology, so it is very useful (I would say a must) to read a book on servlets first. "Java Servlet Programming" from Hunter & Crawford makes a good reading companion. It is complete and generally well written, but I have some points of critique. The book consists of 3 parts (excl. appendices): a) Part 1 "JSP Application Basics" gives a good theoretical overview of the JSP technology and environment. b) Part 2 "JSP Appication Development" gives a complete overview for the developer of the actual JSP pages. But it also has stuff that is only relevant for Java developers (such a Java primer) and lots of examples that can only be understood by reading the chapters in part 3 of the book, meant for Java developers. c) Part 3 "JSP and J2EE and JSP Component Development" is meant for the hardcore Java developer and describes the development of Java Beans and JSP custom actions. It has very strong chapters about how JSP fits in the J2EE architecture and how it combines with servlets. There is also a short chapter about Java Beans, the description is good but the example is incomplete. The last two chapters about JSP Custom Actions and Database Access Components are difficult and rather messy. General points of critique: A) The JSP architecture has as weakness that it does not clearly separate development of HTML content and Java code. Basically this technology shifts the burden from the Java servlet developer to the HTML content developer, who is now very afraid to break Java code embedded in the HTML page. This book suffers from the same problem: the chapter about JSP application development is written too much from a Java development background with too less consideration for the needs of the HTML developer. B) Things are not always explained in the right order, which makes examples difficult to understand. Especially the relation between JSP custom actions and tag libraries became clear to me at the very last moment.
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