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Murach's Java Servlets and JSP
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Second edition
Andrea Steelman, Joel Murach
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Mike Murach & Associates
Published: 2008-01-21 |
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The previous version of "Murach's Servlets and JSPs" was a good book, and this one is too.
The book is described for use as "Training and reference", and while books tend to be good for one purpose or the other I
found this one did manage to accomplish both objectives. The information is presented in small, distinct and incremental sections,
and each block of code is clear and concise. It also contains all of the important information required to get a good start
developing Servlets. I also found the same layout worked well when accessing the information as a reference.
It was very amusing that the book managed to get through four whole chapters before addressing Servlets or JSPs in detail,
but given that many people leap into Servlets while their other technical skills are still growing, this prelude will be valuable
to many beginners. These chapters are spent introducing web programming with Java, setting up Tomcat and the Netbeans IDE,
and a one chapter crash course in HTML.
All of the required topics are covered elegantly, and enough room is left over to provide the same level of coverage for the
next level of knowledge such as SSL, JavaMail, connecting to databases, container managed security and even some raw HTTP.
While I would not usually consider 10 horseshoes for a programming resource, this one is less likely to be read and forgotten,
and should be of use for the first few years of Servlet programming for the novice. Therefore it is easy to recommend adding
this one to your bookshelf.
(David O'Meara - Sheriff,
April 2008)
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Mike Murach & Associates
Published: 2008-01-21 |
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"Murach's Java Servlets and JSPs" covers a broad range of web development related topics such as servlets and JSP. It
uses a two-page layout, with theory on the left page, and examples, figures, code, summary on the right page.
The book starts with a step-by-step installation of Tomcat 6, Netbeans and MySql, following with instructions on how
to use each of them. Then starts the journey to web application development: Servlets, JSP, EL, JSTL, custom tags, filters,
listeners. From scriptlets to the Expression Language, from MVC Model 1 to Model 2, using database, JavaMail, dealing with
security, everything is clearly written and logically explained. I found that the chapter on custom tags could have been more
polished, and a chapter on Tag Files would have been welcome too.
The icing on the cake is all the hands-on exercises. Each chapter concludes with a summary, and practical exercises.
I strongly recommend downloading the sample applications and going through each exercise carefully, as it will certainly improve
your learning experience. Moreover, the last section introduces a music store application to put all the freshly assimilated
knowledge into practice.
This book is mainly aimed at beginners, but it is still a great refresher for experienced users. It is very practical,
and will make Servlets and JSP fun to learn. It is so enjoyable that you'll finish reading it in no time. I wish I had such
a book when I started developing web applications. Highly recommended.
(Christophe Verre - Bartender,
February 2008)
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First edition
Andrea Steelman, Joel Murach
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Mike Murach & Associates
Published: 2003-01 |
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If you are looking for a book that is going to teach you Servlets and JSP in a very easy way with a lot of hand holding then
you are looking for this book. The authors make the assumption that the reader knows the basics of Java but has absolutely
no knowledge of internet programming.
The authors start by guiding the reader through the process of installing Tomcat (all the samples use Tomcat as the servlet
engine) and creating a simple HTML page before they introduce you to Servlets and JSP. Servlets and JSP are covered separately
and then working together in the Model 2 architecture. The one thing missing from this section is any mention of Struts or
other MVC frameworks. Advanced topics such as using SSL and restricting access to a web site are covered very well and in
a way that makes it easy to follow and understand. The authors even show how to write your own tag libraries. Unfortunately,
no mention is made of JSTL. The authors show how to install and use MySQL and how to code SQL before moving on to explain
using JDBC in a web application. The book ends with a complete sample application of an online store including secure credit
card handling.
This is an excellent tutorial that will painlessly teach you how to write complex web applications. I doubt that there is
another book available that makes the subject this easy to understand.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
June 2003)
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Struts Design and Programming
Budi Kurniawan
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BrainySoftware.com
Published: 2005-04 |
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You can save lot of time on browsing Internet on finding tutorials on Struts, yes this book gives you everything that you
need to know on programming Struts.
Best buy for both the beginners and the experts, also tips you as a handy reference.
This book serves more than a tutorial on Struts. Even though you can find lot of free short online tutorials, this book made
a great deal on putting together explaining every concept of the framework in a precise and down to earth manner.
You don't have to refer other books/sites, because each chapter is fully driven with examples, screen shots of application
output framed on a browser, screen shots of webapp directory structure and the code snippets.
I particularly liked the chapters that covered the tasks like file upload, dataacesss,l18n and paging-sorting. I also liked
the table listing the attributes, type and a short definition of every tag which is something that every programmer will look
for.
The example codes were made ready to use with no complexity on configuring and understanding the package structure. (A little
work is needed anyway).
Overall this is one of the effective Struts tutorial available in the market now.
(Balaji Loganathan - Bartender,
May 2005)
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Professional JSP
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Third edition
by Simon Brown et al
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Apress
Published: 2003-09-10 |
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The title is a bit deceiving. Anyone who is familiar with or has read any of the previous Pro JSP editions knows this.
This is Pro JSP Third Edition. It has been completely updated to cover the JSP 2.0 and the new Servlet 2.4 specification.
But this is called Pro JSP. What do JSPs have to do with Servlets? If this is a question you are asking, you should probably
go buy this book.
I feared the worst. An entire book about JSP. I'm going to learn how to code complete web applications using only JSP.
This book is so much more. Not only does it cover about as much JSP as anyone can take, but it does it in the context of
Model 2/MVC designed web applications. Chapter 1 page 7 begins with JavaServer Pages Best Practices. Talk about cutting
to the chase.
The point I am making is that this book focuses on JSP but in the context of a well designed J2EE web application. It discusses
other APIs when necessary to tie in the necessary components into your JSPs.
Did I mention this book covers the JSTL? How about choosing the best persistent layer for your application? Security?
Yep, this book has just about everything you need to learn how to write well designed, secure, and robust J2EE web applications
using JavaServer Pages as your view. And they still just called it Pro JSP.
(Gregg Bolinger - Sheriff,
February 2004)
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Second edition
by Simon Brown et al
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Sample chapter
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Wrox Press
Published: 2001-04 |
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I used the first edition of this book as my bible when I began to learn JSP. It ended up getting really battered since everyone
in my office has borrowed it at some point. Now they can have it because now I have the second edition. The cool thing about
the second edition is that although there are a bunch of new authors it's just as valuable to anyone developing JSP applications.
This version covers JSP 1.1 and 1.2 and Servlets 2.2 and 2.3 plus Tag Libraries, the Struts Framework, Servlet Filtering,
JDBC, XML, XLST and EJB. Edition 2 is a HUGE book but is really well indexed and extremely well-written. The code examples
are available for download and they discuss how install, configure and implement them on Tomcat. Whilst I was reading this
book I was asked to write a custom tag at work; four chapters of this book are dedicated to custom tags and I followed it
through to create what is apparently a quite complex tag, without too many problems. One of the chapters is even dedicated
to Custom Tag idioms which was extremely useful. JSP is growing all the time. This book will tell you just about anything
you need to know. Yes it's big, yes it looks pricey but cheaper than five seperate books covering the same stuff. Plus it's
completely up to date with the new specs so won't be out of date for a while.
(Angela Poynton - sheriff,
June 2001)
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Java Servlet Programming
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Second edition
by Jason Hunter, William Crawford
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Sample chapter
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O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Published: 2001-04-03 |
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The book is a Revised Version of the first edition rewritten to cover the latest Servlet API specification 2.2 as well as
to introduce the major changes in the upcoming 2.3 draft spec. The book begins with chapters covering the history of Servlets
and a quick introduction to Web applications/HTTP that offers an insight into the world of Servlets for newbies. The following
chapters quickly delve into core topics such as Servlet lifecycle, session tracking techniques, using JSPs with Servlets (there
is a lot of emphasis on this in the book), Applet to Servlet communication and Servlet chaining and collaboration. Brief notes
are scattered throughout the book that talks about changes in the 2.2 spec pertaining to specific contexts. The book includes
several supplementary chapters that focus on leveraging technologies such as JDBC, WAP/WML, SSL J2EE and Internationalization.
These quick tutorials blend very well with the overall premise of the book and help paint a holistic picture of a typical
Servlet application. I found the J2EE refresher and the section on Taglibs very informative and so much better than what many
web sites have to offer. The concluding chapters cover Servlets in action - many alternative Servlet frameworks such as Element
Construction Set (ECS), XMLC, Tea, and WebMacro/Velocity that stand as evidence to the popularity and applicability of this
great technology. This is a must-have book. The exactitude, clarity and comprehensiveness makes it a worthy addition to any
Java developer's bookshelf.
(Ajith Kallambella - sheriff,
June 2001)
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First edition
by Jason Hunter
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O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Published: 2001-04-03 |
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This book is probably the most popular servlet book right now. It's an above average book. And has some useful information.
I felt many of the examples could have been simpler. Some of the text too. Some of the examples and text had some outdated
info. Overall, I would say that this is a five steps forward, one step back kind of book. Second Edition is now out!
(Paul Wheaton ,
January 2000)
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Struts 2 Design and Programming
Budi Kurniawan
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BrainySoftware
Published: 2008-01-25 |
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I'm convinced this is and will remain the authoritative book on Struts 2. I know that more are being written but I don't care.
You will not find one better.
I've never worked with Struts 2 in the past yet I was able to get a pretty solid understanding of it in a very short amount
of time. Granted, I've had plenty of experience with the original Struts, JSF, and other web technologies, but I think even
a beginner could pick this up fairly easily.
I let a friend of mine who had used Struts 2 on a project before skim through my copy of Struts 2 Design and Programming to
check for any gaping holes or errant information before writing this review. It passed his inspection. (Thanks, Eric!)
I initially was a little skeptical when I saw that this Struts 2 book includes many other topics like DAOs, Velocity, FreeMarker,
Dojo, and JFreeChart. These sections actually were quite pleasant to read and were great introductions to those topics without
taking anything away from the main topic.
When you start making your way into chapters 5 and 6, feel free to jump around to other chapters. Come back to these chapters
every once in a while to chew off two or three of the tags at a time. This tip will add to your reading enjoyment.
Overall, this is a terrific book and I highly recommend it to anyone working with or curious about Struts 2.
(Marc Peabody - Bartender,
February 2008)
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Professional Apache Tomcat 6
Vivek Chopra, Sing Li, Jeff Genender
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Wrox
Published: 2007-08-13 |
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I was really impressed with this book and felt like it had been written with my requirements in mind. The other Tomcat books
I have read felt like they were paraphrasing the online help; additional material was provided, but little of it was new.
While reading the first few chapters of this book, several of my ongoing queries had been answered, and there were a bunch
of other gems as well - it sorted out my AJP and APR queries, gave options for running Tomcat on privileged ports without
running as root, and dug further into the server.xml configuration than I.
Professional Apache Tomcat 6 is aimed at the serious Tomcat user. It will be useful to people that do serious tinkering at home, but it is a an absolute
bible if you have Tomcat running production code or other critical uses.
Personally I found that the level of information did not always provide 100% coverage but, for example, the level of detail
provided covering server.xml, web.xml and context.xml configuration will be of great use. The descriptions go into plenty
of detail but rarely goes overboard. Examples of places to hook into or extend the existing functionality are pointed out,
but the authors don't get distracted in providing sample implementations when the defaults are sufficient. The information
is full of the sort professional advice and directions that I would expect from a book of this name, and that has been sadly
missing from the other offerings I have seen.
As a short description, it covers topics like AJP connectors, Apache Portable Runtime libraries, configuring Tomcat behind
IIS or Apache servers, clustering, shared hosting, oodles of configuration options, and also takes two chapters to look at
testing the performance and then tuning applications running Tomcat.
If I had to provide negative comments, I would say that the book was written by three authors and at times it doesn't mesh
well and it is clear that one section had a different author to another. There were also a couple of areas that didn't have
the coverage I had hoped, but in most cases an explanation was given as to why this was done.
Realistically I find it difficult to fault this book and look forward to migrating our own servers to Tomcat 6 and tweaking
the behaviour using the information provided. With this book in hand I feel completely confident that I have the know-how
to set up the environment correctly.
(David O'Meara - Sheriff,
January 2008)
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JavaServer Pages
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Third edition
Hans Bergsten
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O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Published: 2003-12-01 |
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JSP lovers, don't look further: this book is for you!! The third edition of JavaServer Pages by Hans Bergsten is not just
an update of the second edition. It contains plenty of fresh material and covers the new JSP 2.0 and Java Standard Template
Library 1.1 specifications. JSTL provides a significant number of ready-to-use JSP tags for accessing databases, internationalizing
page contents and for manipulating variables, URLs and XML streams. Together, JSP and JSTL make it very easy to quickly develop
dynamic and attractive web sites.
This book represents an excellent and complete resource that is beneficial not only to Java developers but also to non-programmers
who may now participate in the creation of dynamic web pages and custom tag libraries by means of the so-called tag files
without writing a single line of Java code. Several chapters contain great material for learning the JSP-related objectives
of the new Sun Certified Web Component Developer certification exam (1.4).
Furthermore, the author goes beyond the honorable task of technically describing JSPs by providing deep insights as to how
JSP, servlets and the Struts framework fit together into the J2EE big picture. He also presents advanced subjects, such as
performance issues in database access, page caching, JSP precompilation, error handling and authentication.
Finally, the book provides many appendices among which you will find an exhaustive reference of JSTL actions and JSP elements
(including the Expression Language) as well as the JSTL and JSP APIs.
(Valentin Crettaz - Sheriff,
April 2004)
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Second edition
Hans Bergsten
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O'Reilly
Published: 2002-08-15 |
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If you have read the first edition of this book, you will notice the difference. More examples, lots of information of what
has changed since then including JSP 1.2 spec changes and how the new technologies like XML and JSTL from Sun has changed
the way programmers work with JSP.
The book offers more than a quick JSP tutorial. The readers will be introduced to "buddy" Java technologies like EJB, JDBC
and of course plain Java servlets. All the examples have been tried on Apache Tomcat. The author also talks about web architecture
and realizing the MVC pattern using JSPs. Naturally, you will find jars and jars full of beans and custom tags.
Speaking of custom tags, the readers should expect to get lost wandering through a plethora "ora" tags written by the author
himself. It will make one wonder if they just bought a custom tag book wrongly titled as a JSP guide!. The author heavily
relies on his own "ora" custom tag library to explain plain and standard concepts such as JDBC instead of teaching the readers
to write code from scratch using Sun s JSP.
To summarize, this is a nice JSP book for beginners. But if you already know JSPs and have been working with them for a
while, be ready for a <jsp:world-full-of-custom-tag> perspective, and take things with a pinch of salt.
(Ajith Kallambella - Sheriff,
October 2002)
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First edition
Hans Bergsten
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Sample chapter
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O'Reilly
Published: 2000-12-01 |
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The book is broken down into three sections: JSP Application Basics, JSP Application Development and JSP in J2EE and JSP
Component Development. There is sufficient detail to assist a team through the development of a site using JSP's. I believe
the intention on the layout is to segregate the tasks of developing the Presentation from the development of the applications
logic. However, the breakdown of the three sections, make it difficult in my opinion to get a grasp on things. This stems
from the fact that while JSP was developed so someone who knows little or no Java could still create effective dynamic pages
with JSP. Personally, I don't feel JSP has achieved this yet. A person could read up to chapter 15 before realizing that ora
isn't a standard JSP element or instruction. The book constantly makes forward reference, which unless you read things out
of the intended order, leave you lost to the workings of the example they are on. After reading through the book completely,
quite a few things clear up. I it will definitely be a well-used reference from my bookshelf.
(Carl Trusiak - sheriff,
February 2001)
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JSTL: Practical Guide for JSP Programmers
Sue Spielman
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Morgan Kaufmann
Published: 2003-08-22 |
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JSTL provides a set of common tag libraries for JSP programmers. This book explains the JSTL and it does it extremely well.
In about 200 pages, the book covers what the JSTL is, what to use it for, how to use it, and gives plenty of examples.
The start of the book covers the basics of tag libraries and explains why we need JSTL. Next, the basics of JSTL and the
expression language are covered. The one small flaw in the book is that the expression language could have been covered in
a bit more detail. The rest of the book covers each of the tags (actions) broken up into the separate libraries. The core,
XML, internationalization and formatting, and SQL actions are each given their own chapters. The author doesn't just cover
the tags but also provides enough background information to insure that you can understand how the tags are used. For example,
in the XML chapter, the author starts by explaining the different technologies around XML and then shows how the XML actions
can be used to simplify the task of using XML in your JSPs. The SQL chapter explains why you would never want to use the
SQL actions before she discusses the actions themselves. The book ends with a "quick reference" section.
Sue Spielman has a very easy writing style that makes reading her books a pleasure. Her book is short and complete, a very
difficult combination to pull off.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
October 2003)
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Morgan Kaufmann
Published: 2003-08-22 |
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This might be one of the most effective IT book I have ever read. It's short but comprehensive. All four libraries are
covered and covered quite well.
The first few chapters provide an introduction to JSTL, including the reasons and a few brief examples. The chapter on the
EL seemed to be the weakest chapter, but it was detailed enough to get a solid start with using it.
Each library has a pretty good sized chapter with coverage of all of the tags and their most common attributes. The code
samples covered what you are most likely to do with the tags, although I would have like to see some uncommon uses as well.
The only negative was the sample code that I downloaded from the site. Although the book states that it was tested with
Tomcat 4.1.20 and Tomcat 5.0. In both cases, I had problems with Tomcat validating the web.xml file. A few simple changes
and the code was up and running, though.
Overall, this book provides a quick source of information for learning JSTL.
(Matthew Phillips - Bartender,
September 2003)
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Professional Apache Tomcat
Vivek Chopra, Ben Galbraith, Sing Li, Chanoch Wiggers, Amit Bakore, Debashish Bhattacharjee, Sandip Bhattacharya, Chad Fowler, Romin Irani
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Wrox
Published: 2002-10-04 |
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This book is a solid, well-rounded guide to using Apache Tomcat and getting the most out of it. The authors cover a wide
number of topics, including installation, modification, managing services, and even testing applications for server load.
I was particularly pleased with the clean language and style of the book, something I had noted before in Sing Li's Wrox book
on Jini. Li is a contributing author here as well.
The only objection I have really isn't a fault of the book at all, but it nonetheless hampers my ability to read it carefully.
So much work is done these days to convert configuration and property files into XML formats, that books like this one are
often forced to explain features by showing example XML files and encouraging the reader to parse it visually. Sweet mama,
that's boring; fortunately, the authors keep this aspect to a minimum.
I recommend it to anyone who needs a desktop reference for learning all the aspects of Apache Tomcat as they need them.
(Michael Ernest - Sheriff,
February 2003)
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JSTL in Action
by Shawn Bayern
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Manning Publications
Published: 2002-07 |
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A nicely written book about JSTL (JSP Standard Tag Library). Its expected audience consists of HTML and JSP developers who
can be unfamiliar with Java, as well as experienced Java programmers.
A reader without programming experience will probably benefit most. The book is beginner-friendly on all levels of organization.
Terminology is relaxed without being sloppy: correspondence to both formal lexicon and "field jargon" is given. Every important
word and concept is explained, often with vivid (or bizarre, depending on your taste) metaphors. It will be long time before
I forget author's definition of "scope" that compared it to flying rats...
The words "in action" in the book's title aren't just words, it is a methodological principle. The discussion concentrates
on practice rather than theory and specifications; each JSTL tag comes with examples - from "elementary" tasks - how to set
encoding or print numbers in assorted formats, to parsing XML and performing SQL queries. There are more complex projects,
like writing an online survey, message board and a simple web portal from scratch - toys that look so real and their code
so simple that you want to try it out.
The last part is targeted at Java programmers and deals with issues like performance improving, configuration, and developing
custom tags - JSTL supports even this!
And if all this is not enough, then you should know: there are jokes scattered throughout the book, so you do not want to
skip pages for not to miss one!
(Margarita Isayeva - Sheriff,
August 2002)
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Java Servlets Developer's Guide
by Karl Moss
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McGraw-Hill/OsborneMedia
Published: 2002-02-21 |
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Full of insights and practical examples for those who persevere. Occasionally , the book is incomplete, perhaps with the
expectation that the reader "ought to know" by now. One such example is Chapter 10 "Applet-to-Servlet Coomunication ", where
one is left wondering how to extend "BaseTunnelClient". More please, Mr Moss !
(Arthur Chan - GreenHorn,
October 2002)
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McGraw-Hill/OsborneMedia
Published: 2002-02-21 |
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I started this book with a very basic understanding of Servlets. A good book increases your knowledge of a subject without
boring you to tears. This book does that. The book has many examples with very good explanations of not only the code but
why the code was even written. It is easy to read and understand. It covers from setting up the server configuration to wireless
and WML. The book's format is well designed starting at the very basics and moving through the more advanced topics. If you
want to increase your knowledge (or start) of Servlets, I feel this is the book to read.
(Paul Stevens - bartender,
April 2002)
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Professional JSP Site Design, Coding Core Web Applications
by Kevin Duffey, et al
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Wrox Press
Published: 2001-11 |
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The book talks about Jakarta Struts, caching issues, coping with frames, navigation tips, security, search engines, and other
very practical topics. This is a great book for the intermediate-level Java Web Application Developer (JWAD). If you are looking
for a chance to get your hands dirty with the practical aspects of the topic, and get an understanding of the real-life problems,
then the vast amount of the info and resources given in this book will definitely quench your thirst. Introductions to Jakarta
Struts, Lucene, and Apache JetSpeed are great.
If you are an experienced JWAD or have read other related titles from Wrox's Professional books, you might want to take
a peek at this book before buying it (or just buy the book to redirect the possible headache assets to it). Here are the downsides:
chapters don't support each other (info given previously is not being used in the following chapters), and you might have
a really hard time getting the downloaded code to work (too many different files are needed, too many set-ups, and why don't
they provide ready-to-go *.war files?)
(Ersin Eser - Bartender,
February 2002)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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More Servlets and JSP
by Marty Hall
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Pearson Education
Published: 2001-12-26 |
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The book takes a very practical approach to teaching Servlets and JSP. It is a follow-up of the earlier book "Core Servlets
and JSP" and the explanation follows a very similar pattern. This book deals with Servlet 2.3 and JSP 1.2 Specifications,
though. Well, except for the introduction to JSP, some portion of which uses the 1.1 Specification - I felt that this was
redundant. I mean, why introduce a topic in 1.1 Specification when you claim the book to be following 1.2 Specification. However,
the author later explains the differences in a whole new chapter by itself with examples following the 1.2 Specification.
The source code is available online and the text book gives a good explanation of the relevant topics. This book also deals
with web-applications including detailed chapters on deployment, security and filters. The author takes the pain of explaining
where each file goes using three different servers. I would say that this is the highlight of the book.
If you already have the "Core Servlets and JSP", I doubt this book would add too much value except for the newer topics.
If you don't have that book then I would recommend this book.
(Madhav Lakkapragada - Bartender,
February 2002)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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JSP, Servlets, and MySQL
by David Harms
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John Wiley & Sons
Published: 2001-04 |
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This book will help you get your Java Servlets, JSPs and MySQL databases to work together and provide a full-fledged dynamic
database-driven web site. The author, David Harms, masters at presenting the concepts clearly. Server-side Java components
--JSP, Servlets and JavaBeans-- are briefly introduced. Then, the author explains what relational databases are and why the
latter are so important when designing dynamic web sites. He also goes into the details of installing, configuring and running
the MySQL server and client as well as how to properly design a database.
The Model-View-Controller (Model 2) design pattern is introduced in a way that definitely shows how each of its component
areas perfectly map to server-side Java components and databases, that is Java servlets take the role of the Controller, JSP
and custom tags the role of the View and JavaBeans and the database the role of the Model. Such decomposition makes any application
very flexible and easily maintainable.
The final part is dedicated to some strategies one can use to make benefit of its database, like how to authenticate users,
survey them, collect server statistics and so on. The Struts application framework which already implements perfectly the
MVC design pattern is also briefly introduced.
(Valentin Crettaz - Bartender,
January 2002)
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Beginning JSP Web Development
by Jayson Falkner (Editor), John Timney, Casey Kochmer, Romin Irani, Perrumal Krishnaraj, Meeraj Moidoo Kunnumpurath, Sathya
Narayana Panduranga, Ben Galbraith
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Wrox Press
Published: 2001-08 |
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The goal of this book is to wake up the web developer sleeping in you. A prerequisite is a basic understanding of static
HTML. No programming experience is required though, yet advised. The book starts from scratch. About a third of it spends
time introducing Java (language basics, OO, utility classes, exception handling, etc) and SQL. The book also focuses on how
to best structure a web application and how the latter's components (JSP, Servlets and beans) work and collaborate behind
the scenes.
A good part is dedicated to showing how to access files, query databases and send electronic mails from web applications.
One chapter introduces, in detail, Apache's Struts framework. Finally, a complete web application is designed and implemented
from scratch using Struts and all techniques presented in the book.
Basically, the book is well-organized and provides lots of well-commented code examples.
(Valentin Crettaz - Bartender,
December 2001)
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Advanced Java Server Pages
by David M. Geary
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Prentice Hall PTR
Published: 2001-05-29 |
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The basics of JSP are easy to learn for anyone familiar with HTML and Java but it is difficult to learn the many advanced
features. This book covers the complexities of JSP very well and helps to make them simple and easy to understand.
The book starts with coverage of JSP custom tags, one of the most important features of JSP. HTML forms and JSP templates
are covered next. The section on templates is extremely useful for those who wish to use pluggable components to build web
sites. The best part of the book for me were the middle chapters which cover designing a Model 2 framework using servlets
and JSP. The framework is generic and can be applied to any web site development effort. He then demonstrates how event handling
can be used within the framework to provide internationalization, authentication, and form resubmission trapping. (Have your
users ever created additional profiles by using the back button?) The next chapter demonstrates using custom tags to access
databases. The author then shows different ways to process XML with JSP. The final chapter is a case study demonstrating all
the techniques used throughout the book.
Code samples are found throughout the book and I had no trouble getting any of them to run in Tomcat. The tag libraries
are provided as open source by the author and will be helpful for most developers. The book is very well written and will
be useful for anyone interested in advancing their knowledge of JSP.
(Thomas Paul - Bartender,
October 2001)
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JSP : Complete Reference
by Phil Hanna
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McGraw-Hill Companies
Published: 2001-01-15 |
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Review : When reading a tech book, I like to look at 4 things.
1. The organization of the book.
2. The explanations
3. The code
4. The quality of the content
Let me just tell you right up front that JSP, the Complete Reference gets very high marks in all four categories. It was
organized better than any JSP book I have read, and better than most technical books. The author, Phil Hanna, presents you
with a case study that he builds throughout the book.
I generally like this approach but the whole message can get lost if the book is not well organized. That is not the care
here.
Mr. Hanna's explanation of each topic are excellent and he includes great code examples to back them up. When I was first
learning Java I had to use two books: one with easy to follow explanations of items, Thinking In Java by Bruce Eckel, and
one with great code examples, Beginning Java 2 by Ivor Horton. It is nice to find a book with both.
Finally, the content. I always try to buy books that I will use over and over and that will become my reference. Well that
is definitely the case here. Mr. Hanna covers all the aspects of JSP, tag libraries, JSP and XML, JSP and JDBC, Servlets,
and some setup basics i.e. the web.xml file.
This is the 3rd book I have read on JSP and it is by far the best.
(Bill Bozeman - bartender,
June 2001)
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JSP Tag Libraries
by Gal Shachor, Adam Chace, Magnus Rydin
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Sample chapter
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Manning Publications
Published: 2001-05-30 |
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A book dedicated strictly to the development of Tag Libraries. You might think that would be a bit much. No way! The Authors
cover every aspect of developing and using JSP Tags. All the examples are annotated in detail. You quickly learn every detail
you need to start developing sophisticated professional Tags. No stone is left unturned. It covers Tags for JSP 1.1 and JSP
1.2. There are examples for Iteration, decision, JDBC, EJB, JavaMail, WAP etc. A fully functional version of the JDBC-driven
WebStore and EJB-driven WAPStore are available for download along with all the books examples. The book is extremely well
written and edited. I was hard put to find 2 minor errors. Every person or organization developing JSP's should definitely
get copies of this book!
(Carl Trusiak - sheriff,
June 2001)
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Core Servlets and JSP
by Marty Hall
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Prentice Hall PTR
Published: 2000-05-26 |
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A well written book with enough details. The author does a pretty impressive job to clearly describe everything that is required
to understand the subject. All aspects of Servlets and JSP are covered at each step - right from the API till the deployment.
Also, the author explains more than one deployment tool used. I like this approach very much. Most often I have seen people
know about Servlets and JSP but they have trouble putting it together as an application. The approach here talks about creating
your web applications and deploying them. Hence I feel this book is complete in itself. Discussion topics include Beans, Custom
Tags, Forms, JDBC among other topics including some interesting Dilbert Cartoons. The only topic left out is XML, I thought,
but then we know its an ocean on its own. I highly recommend this book.
(Madhav Lakkapragada - bartender,
April 2001)
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Head First Servlets & JSP
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Second edition
Kathy Sierra, Bert Bates, Bryan Basham
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O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Published: 2008-03-25 |
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The second edition of this classic book about the Java Servlet and JSP API continues the tradition of other Head First titles
that liven up the text with pictures, hand-scribbled notes, questions&answers and other devices to engage the reader's brain.
Never having read a Head First book before, this reviewer was pleasantly surprised by how well this works. Even though the
book is much thicker than I consider healthy for a tech book (over 800 pages), it's an easy read thanks to the lively prose
and varied content elements.
The book is billed as a preparation aid for the SCWCD exam, but it also serves as a general introduction to Servlets and JSP.
I found it easy to read individual chapters (e.g. on the Expression Language, servlet filters or custom tags) by themselves
to refresh knowledge on particular topics. It's made clear which exam objectives are covered in each chapter, and there are
exam-style questions and answers that go with the text, plus a brand-new mock exam with as many questions as the actual exam
has.
I recommend this book as a tutorial -- not as a reference -- to anyone needing to come up to speed with servlets/JSP, or in
need of learning aspects of it he hasn't used before. (Disclaimer: The author of this review was one of the tech reviewers
of the book.)
(Ulf Dittmer - Sheriff,
May 2008)
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First edition
Kathy Sierra, Bert Bates, Bryan Basham
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O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Published: 2004-07 |
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Over at the JavaRanch Saloon's Web Component Certification (SCWCD) forum, Head First Servlets & JSP dominates as the book
of choice. It appeals to both those with and those without Java EE experience and I'm constantly amazed at how quickly everyone
learns using this book. The SCWCD testimonies that say "I passed!" are most often appended with "Thank you, Head First, for
such a wonderful book!"
A couple points about what to expect:
* This is no crammer's book. You will get more than book smarts -- you will understand the significance of the questions
and objectives to real world Java enterprise programming.
* Nor is this book a flowery tutorial. This is hardcore programming wisdom. It would take you at least two years of real-world,
painful, trial-and-error experience to gain the equivalent knowledge on your own. That's just stupid.
I passed the SCWCD exam years ago (before Head First Servlets & JSP existed) but now I am going to upgrade my certification
to the latest version. I have never been so confident for an exam before. I am soooo ready!
(Marc Peabody - Bartender,
February 2006)
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Tapestry 5: Building Web Applications
Alexander Kolesnikov
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Packt Publishing
Published: 2008-01-15 |
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"Tapestry 5: Building Web Applications" was not written by the creator of Tapestry, but the author Alexander Kolesnikov is
a contributor to the project and has been associated with the technology for a while. I liked this since when the author is
also the creator, they often want others to love their work the way they do, and the book either feels like they are selling
something or it makes assumptions on knowledge required to learn the technology and misses key points.
The book builds on the features of Tapestry in an easy and nonthreatening manner, so that each example feels accessible to
the reader. In fact it was quite pleasing the way that the features unfolded during the book, and to me this was more of an
encouragement to use the framework than any type of forced sell. There is a pro-Tapestry stance throughout the book, but that
shouldn't be too surprising!
It is worth pointing out that Tapestry was rewritten from version 3 to version 4 to version 5, and while initially this confused
me and gave me fears for V6, it does allow the current version to make use of the full features of Java 5, all of which is
laid out in the book. Since the book does target Tapestry version 5 only, it won't be of direct help to anyone needing help
upgrading from a previous version. The book is also geared more towards learning Tapestry than being a useful resource, so
this should also be taken into account when purchasing.
Now that I have read the book, "Tapestry 5" has succeeded in getting me interested in using Tapestry to build a project of
my own, and the advanced section on creating your own components gave me some ideas...
(David O'Meara - Sheriff,
March 2008)
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Struts: The Complete Reference
James Holmes
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McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Published: 2006-12-11 |
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Don't let the title confuse you: this is more than just a reference book. This book provides a worthy introduction to Struts
in general, as well as references to the various Struts libraries and other components.
The one area I felt this book let's its readers down was in the areas outside of Struts that are still needed when developing
Struts applications. For example, using non-standard HTML constructs (even when the standard constructs would have been easier
to read), or including all the Struts libraries when not all were being used by the application at that time.
However these are minor issues: the book itself is well laid out, and easy to read. Readers who are new to Struts will soon
be able to write their own Struts applications, and readers who already use Struts daily will learn new features and new tricks.
This book starts with the very basics of how to get a Struts application up and running, provides information on how to scale
your Struts applications so that the code and configuration does not become unwieldy, and how to make it a more professional
application with information on internationalization and security. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. When counting
in the reference materials, it is easy to see that this is a book that has something for anyone working with Struts, and is
a valuable addition to any bookshelf.
(Andrew Monkhouse - Sheriff,
June 2007)
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Learning Jakarta Struts 1.2: A concise and practical tutorial
Stephan Wiesner
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Packt Publishing
Published: 2005-08-05 |
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I enjoyed this book, both Mr. Wiesner's style of writing, and the way topics were introduced. The chapters are easy to read,
and I never felt I was being lectured to. In addition, Mr. Wiesner has kept information relevant to the topic at hand without
digressing into background information that might confuse newcomers. From as early as the second chapter you are developing
in Struts, using a simple internationalization example. The chapters gradually build up from there, each one introducing new
concepts in easy to read sections. By the end of the book, you will have created a simple bookstore application.
Mr. Wiesner assumes knowledge of Java, JSP, and Servlets, and expects you to have set up your JDK, Web Container, and Database
before beginning. With this rudimentary knowledge, his introduction to Struts makes sense and examples are given demonstrating
the differences between calling standard Java code from within a JSP and using the Struts equivalents.
My only complaints with this book are that the downloadable source code has not been converted into English (while the source
code in the book has been) - this does not cause a major problem since the downloadable code is still very readable, but it
does mean that the downloadable code does not exactly match the published code. Another issue is that the errata page does
not appear to be regularly updated.
All in all, a very good book, and a welcome introductory book to Struts.
(Andrew Monkhouse - Bartender,
September 2005)
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Beginning JSP 2: From Novice to Professional
Peter Den Haan, Lance Lavandowska, Sathya Narayana Panduranga, Krishnaraj Perrumal
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Apress
Published: 2004-02 |
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"Beginning JSP 2?" Yeah, right. Try: "Beginning JSP 2, HTML, JDBC, Java, JSTL, XML, XSLT, XML DTDs, XML Schemas, Servlets,
Filters, with some MVC (Model 2) and Struts thrown in for Good Measure". While my recommended title is a bit too long to
be practical as a book title, it would better capture the materials covered from an introductory level, in "Beginning JSP
2".
In about 360 pages, through 10 chapters, this book covers the technologies listed above, describing what they are, what they
do, why folks are using them, how to use them, and how they relate and work with other technologies. Following these action
packed chapters, the appendixes serve as great quick references on JSP syntax, implicit JSP objects, and various XML configuration
files.
To nitpick a bit: The book could benefit from some more aggressive editing, in parts, where sentence and paragraph wording
is occasionally a little clumsy, and a few good-to-understand details were left out.
The description on the back cover of the book says, "All you need... is a basic understanding of HTML and Java." I suggest
this be corrected as follows: "All you need to know in order to follow and understand the lessons in 'Beginning JSP 2' is
enough HTML to create a 'Hello World!' web page, and enough Java to create a 'Hello World!' application." On second thought,
even if you can't do those things, yet, after reading this book, you'll be able to do a whole lot more.
(Dirk Schreckmann - Sheriff,
September 2004)
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Pro Jakarta Struts
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Second edition
John Carnell, Rob Harrop
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Apress
Published: 2004-03-01 |
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"Pro Jakarta Struts, Second Edition" by John Carnell with Rob Harrop is the best book on developing Struts-based web applications
I've read. (I've read at least five or six others.)
The title of the book is a bit of a misnomer, as it covers much more than just Struts 1.1 fundamentals. This book aims higher,
including chapters on web application Patterns and Antipatterns, XDoclet, Velocity and ObjectRelationalBridge, along with
good explanations of various Struts-specific topics.
"Pro Jakarta Struts, Second Edition" is a pretty thick book at 578 pages. I didn't notice a single page wasted to printing
some API. It isn't really a technical cookbook to be placed on a nearby shelf for quick reference during development to look
up the basics of using some technology. Instead, the authors focused on good practices used when developing web applications,
including explanations of why a technology should be used and how to use it, recurring problems that others have experienced
(Antipatterns) and what to do instead (Patterns), and other pieces of advice designed to get the reader's brain thinking in
web applications.
If you're in the market for a book on Struts-based web applications, get this one. It covers Struts 1.1 well, but it doesn't
stop where Struts leaves off.
(Dirk Schreckmann - Sheriff,
July 2004)
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Apress
Published: 2004-03-01 |
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This book is the second edition and is a great improvement over the first. Originally released by Wrox, the first edition
was pushed out the door just before they went out of business. Apress bought the book and now publishes it.
In this edition they removed the chapter on Lucene and replaced it with a chapter on Tiles, which was briefly mentioned in
the first edition. Also added are chapters on dynamic forms and the Struts Validator framework and on XDoclet. These chapters,
along with the improvements and corrections in the other chapters make this edition a great choice for those learning Struts
and for those that want to learn how best to architect a Struts based application.
I really admire a book that goes above and beyond teaching the basics and is more than just a glorified tutorial book. Pro
Jakarta Struts goes above and beyond and presents the reader with an easy to read, well written book that gives us a formula
for building successful web applications.
My only suggestion is to skip the chapter on OJB and start learning Hibernate or a JDO implementation for you database mapping
tool. If you are building a simple app with a simple database, then OJB can work for you, but I found it to be fickle. I also
know that if they tried to add a Hibernate chapter, this book would be very large.
If you want to learn Struts the right way, get this book.
(Mark Spritzler - Bartender,
July 2004)
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First edition
John Carnell, Jeff Linwood, Maciej Zawadzki
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Apress
Published: 2003-08-21 |
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This book is a reprint of a Wrox book that APress bought when Wrox went out of business. Although the book has a publication
date of September 2003, it was actually published by Wrox earlier in the year. Also, APress intends on releasing a second
edition of this book (ISBN:159059228X) in December 2003. With that in mind, let's discuss the contents of this book.
The book is broken up into five sections. The first and longest section discusses Struts. This section is very good as
it concentrates on developing a Struts application and demonstrates good design while discussing the issues that make bad
designs bad. This section ends with a look at using ObjectRelationalBridge (OJB) as a data access tier. Unfortunately the
book uses an beta version of OJB (it is still not in release) that makes this section obsolete. The remaining chapters cover
other open source tools available to developers including Velocity (template engine), Lucene (search engine), and Ant (build
tool). Although it is interesting to see how each tool integrates into the Struts application developed earlier, the chapters
are not long enough to give detailed information on any of these tools.
The conclusion is that if you are looking for a book on properly building a Struts application, you probably want to wait
for the second edition. Since the OJB chapter is obsolete and the chapters on the other tools are fairly brief, this book
doesn't provide anything that shouts, "Buy Me" from the shelves.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
October 2003)
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Struts Survival Guide
Srikanth Shenoy, Nithin Mallya
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ObjectSource Publications
Published: 2004-02 |
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Struts Survival Guide explains a lot of the Struts platform, and gives many effective code snippets to help guide the learning
process. This book is good for someone who is just learning Struts or has previously been exposed to it and wants to learn
more about all the bells and whistles. When each concept is introduced it's explained well and then the reason behind why
you would or wouldn't want to use the technique is given. That kind of discussion really helps the reader to understand how
they might use it in their own application.
I have two main issues with the book:
* The first is all the grammar and spelling errors that plague the book. At times it gets distracting and makes the book
a bit tough to follow. But this problem may be easily addressed in a future printing the book.
* The second is their index (or lack thereof). While reviewing the book I was working on a Struts project and would often
grab the book to understand a new tag or a new concept that I'd never used before, but the index rarely listed the concept
I was searching for even though I knew the book covered the topic because I'd read about it previously. For this reason,
I believe the book is better read cover to cover and not as a desk reference. But the $15 price and the 225-page length makes
buying it for that purpose easy to handle.
(Jessica Sant - Sheriff,
July 2004)
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Art of Java Web Development
Neal Ford
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Manning Publications
Published: 2003-11-01 |
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This book is about using frameworks for developing Java web applications. The author gives a thorough overview of some of
the most popular frameworks and discusses the pros and cons of various web architectures. The discussion is almost exclusively
in the Servlet/JSP realm with little discussion of back end applications servers. The audience that will find this book most
useful are those who have some experience with Java web development and are looking to expand their knowledge of modern web
architectures.
The first part of the book is a discussion of Java web architecture in general with a concentration on MVC architecture.
The second part is an examination of some of the most popular frameworks in use today. This part is interesting as the author
demonstrates the same application developed in the various frameworks. The section finishes with a list of criteria to use
when evaluating any framework for your own development projects. The final part is a discussion of best practices in various
aspects of a web architecture such as resource management, performance, and debugging. This section reads almost as a series
of articles.
The book is not really a how-to guide to using the various frameworks. I had trouble getting a couple of the examples working
exactly as provided and some of the discussion was a bit confusing. But the overall view of how to choose and then incorporate
a framework into a well designed architecture makes the book a very worthwhile read.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
March 2004)
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Core JSTL: Mastering the JSP Standard Tag Library
David Geary
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Prentice Hall PTR
Published: 2002-12-06 |
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The JSP Standard Tag Library is designed to simplify many of the difficult tasks encountered while creating JSPs. This book
covers the new built-in tags and the expression language which are part of JSTL. The book describes itself as a "definitive"
guide and that fairly well sums it up. JSTL is covered in excellent detail with lots of examples and sample code. The book
is divided into three parts. The first part introduces JSTL and discusses the JSTL expression language. Examples of proper
usage as well as common errors are shown. The next part covers the tags themselves (referred to as actions). This part is
split over several chapters including chapters on conditional actions, iteration actions, i18n actions, database actions,
and XML actions. Each action is covered in detail with at least one example of its usage. The final section is a short reference
covering all the actions. Overall, I found this book to be very well written guide to JSTL. I think most Servlet/JSP developers
will find this to be an excellent resource for learning JSTL. There were a couple of places in the book that I found the author's
explanations a little confusing but overall he does an excellent job of helping to understand how to properly use JSTL. You
should note that there is a misprint in the book that gives an incorrect URL for the site to download the source code. The
correct site is: http://www.core-jstl.com.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
February 2003)
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Struts In Action
Ted Husted, Cedric Dumoulin, George Franciscus, and David Winterfeldt
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Manning Publications
Published: 2002-11 |
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Although the title of this book is not descriptive, I cannot deny the author's approach to making the reader a Struts expert
is effective.
Section 1 is an introduction to Struts. By the end of the section you have written your first Struts application. This
is great for someone with no prior knowlege of Struts.
Section 2 delves into the details of Struts framework. It gets away from a hands on approach to explain the details. It
covers Actions, ActionForms, etc. quite well. The sample code accompanying the explanations is not enough to run, but it
did help me understand the topics better.
Section 3 continues the same approach to learning as section 2 but concentrates on the presentation layer tools. One of
my complaints about this book relates to its coverage of the Struts tag libraries. The chapter is clearly intended to compliment
the online documentation at the Struts website and it really doesn't provide much value over it. The coverage of Tiles, validation,
and localization are excellent.
Section 4 gets back to the hands on approach to effectively tie everything together. The book's organization lends itself
to being a great reference, but I would have liked it to take a more hands on approach and build a large application piece
by piece. I still learned more about Struts than I knew existed. I would not hesitate recommending this book to anyone that
wants to go from Struts beginner to Struts expert.
(Matthew Phillips - Bartender,
November 2002)
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Mastering Jakarta Struts
James Goodwill
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Wiley
Published: 2002-09 |
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This book takes a good step by step approach to giving the reader an understanding of struts. Good examples and explanations
of each topic covered fairly well. Don't let the title (Mastering Jakarta Struts) deceive you. The book says it is meant as
a tutorial on Stuts and that is what it is. So if you already have an understanding of Struts this book won't be right. But
if you are looking to get familiar with Struts this book is a good starter.
I would like to give the author James Goodwill a big thumbs up. The source code for the book was not on the Wiley site and
James emailed it to me right away.
(Paul Stevens - Bartender,
September 2002)
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Professional JSP Tag Libraries
Simon Brown
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Peer Information
Published: 2002-04 |
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This book is a great introduction and tutorial on writing JSP custom tags. It takes a step-by-step and very detailed approach
to the subject and has lots of example code. Chapters build on the information presented in previous chapters, so this is
one of those books you really do want to read from start to finish. I think you'll want to do this anyway...
The book can be divided, like Gaul, into three parts. The first part (Chapters 1-7) takes the reader from constructing simple
tags through Body Tags and finally to tags that cooperate with other tags to perform a task. The second section (Chapters
8-10) discusses the situations that custom tags should be used for and provides examples, design approaches for tags and tag
libraries, and how to validate and deploy your tags. The chapter on validation addresses validation in the tag handler itself,
in a TagExtraInfo class, and the use of the TagLibraryValidator class to validate pages that import a tag library. The last
two chapters present a case study and brief overviews of Struts tags, Jakarta Taglibs, and the Java Standard Tag Library (JSTL).
The book focuses on tag capabilities in JSP 1.2 but you can use most of what is presented in JSP 1.1. In fact, the chapter
on Body Tags re-visits an iteration example from a previous chapter to demonstrate how tags that iterate over a collection
can be developed in JSP 1.1.
(John Wetherbie - Bartender,
September 2002)
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Web Development with JavaServer Pages
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Second edition
by Duane K. Fields, Mark A. Kolb, Shawn Bayern
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Manning Publications
Published: 2001-09-15 |
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Having 'field tested' the first edition of "Web Development with Java Server Pages" on several projects, I was anxious to
see what the authors had in store with this second edition. I have to say that it was worth the wait, though some new additions
or lack there of, did give me pause. Foremost, it should be noted that the original material remains intact and, based on
this alone, the second edition gets same hearty recommendation as before. However, a more basic introduction has been added
which, for me, changed the tone of the initial chapters completely. Understandably, though, it does provide a "more gentle"
introduction for those new to the topic. As well, with so many similarities between some of the books' architectures (see
chapter 10) and several popular presentation frameworks (i.e. Struts), I was struck with the sense that these should have
been introduced as well. Most significantly, the book updates the discussion to include JSP 1.2 and Servlets 2.3 throughout
and includes chapters covering Filters and Listeners. The discussion of filters alone garners this edition an extra horseshoe
with its excellent coverage of this topic (personally, I feel that filters add potential for component re-use and abstraction
that has not existed in J2EE applications to date). Finally, the addition of a chapter on "non-html" content, though brief,
is welcome for its coverage of XML, Excel spreadsheets and code generation.
(Sean MacLean - Bartender,
August 2002)
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First edition
by Duane K. Fields and Mark A. Kolb
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Sample chapter
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Manning Publications
Published: 2000-05-15 |
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Working as a Java programmer for large distributed systems, I anxiously awaited the opportunity to read the Fields and Kolb's
"Web development with Java Server Pages" and I was certainly not disappointed. Assuming a firm grounding in both basic HTML
and Java skills (since, thankfully, "intro to..." chapters are not included), the book maintains a concise focus on presenting
JSP technology to both presentation-layer developers and server-side programmers.
This is not a book littered with examples in the early going (plenty in the latter chapters, though), but rather it focuses
on discussions of the 'how and why' for many aspects of the technology. An added bonus is the underlying current of JSP as
an aide to the development process itself through structural and logical separation (particularly the inspiring discussions
in the opening chapters).
One complaint I have is that there is not accompanying CD containing the source for the examples. Though it is available
on-line, there is some to be said for the immediacy and permanence of having it on disc.
All in all, this offering from Fields and Kolb serves very well as introduction to web development using JSP for both experienced
professionals and beginners alike.
(Sean MacLean - Bartender,
August 2001)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Enterprise Java Servlets
by Jeff M.Genender
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Pearson Education
Published: 2001-09-04 |
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The book is about single-dispatch-Servlet architecture in which the author's primary goal is to encapsulate and protect its
own resources from outside applications and write easy to maintain and extendable applications. The book needs to be read
from beginning to the end. Randomly reading a chapter will not be useful. It is a really good resource for intermediate level
Java Servlet programmers. Advanced programmers might find it lite. It is not for the beginners. Prepare yourself to read lots
of code. The chapters related to error logging is very useful by addressing how to create manageable and readable error logs.
Pooling concepts are very practical by addressing how to create pools; managing pool's resources before checking them in
and/or out from the pool; how to centralize its control so developers don't have to worry about it over and over again.
LDAP is an excellent intro.
JSP is about how to integrate JSP into his design.
His design might not be the right or the best way, but the ideas and solutions in this book certainly teaches a lot and
will improve design. And if you happen to like his architecture you will have all of his code; just add whatever you want
to and tweak it: You will be up and running in a very short time. The author currently does not have a supporting web site.
The cd-rom does not come with a make file. He does not provide UML documentation.
(Ersin Eser - Bartender,
November 2001)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Java Developer's Guide to Servlets and JSP
by Bill Brodgen
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Sybex Inc
Published: 2000-10 |
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There is no question that Bill Brogden has done a fine job of covering the subject matter in this book. He discusses the
Servlet and JSP APIs and their uses in depth, as well as giving GREAT example code. It is packed with related topics including
XML, JDBC, RMI, JNDI, LDAP, Enterprise JavaBeans etc.
This book is not aimed at beginners, but rather assumes a familiarity with Java and related technologies, and that the reader
is just expanding into Servlets and JSPs. In particular it is assumed that the reader is familiar with HTML.
I did have a little problem with the organization of the book. The book starts with how Web Servers handle HTTP requests
and discusses how Servlet Engines work. However at no time does he explain WHAT a servlet is, and he just assumes that you
know that Servlets are handled with servlet engines. He starts right out using XML in his examples, even though the topic
of XML is not introduced until chapter 6. Then, at that point he starts explaining it from step one as though you had never
heard of it before. As the book progressed and became more topic by topic oriented this was no longer a problem.
My favorite part is the chapter that Paul Wheaton (of JavaRanch fame) helped write - Applet to Applet communication. OK
so I am biased!
If you need to understand Servlets and JSPs in depth, this book will do the trick.
(Cindy Glass - Bartender,
October 2001)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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Java Developers Guide to E-Commerce with XML and JSP
by Bill Brogden and Chris Minnick
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Sybex Books
Published: 2001-01-16 |
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This book is unrelentingly practical. This is both its main advantage and its biggest drawback.
The book describes, in great detail, how to build and set up an XML-driven e-commerce web site using a single case study.
Each of the concepts covered (XML, DTD, Catalog, Shopping Cart, Look and Feel, Surveys, Payment Processing, News feeds etc.)
gets a few pages of introduction and a chapter of annotated code. The advantage of this approach is that the reader is never
left with hanging questions about just how to implement something - every bracket and semicolon is there.
The disadvantage is that hardly any coverage is given to alternative approaches. EJB and XSLT get a few pages, HTML templating
gets just one line! The code examples are solid, but seem a little "old fashioned"; there's no use of the Collections API,
JDOM or XSLT, for example. Don't let any of this discourage you though - consider these points as options for further study.
The code is all on the supplied CD, and you are free to tinker with it.
If you are a programmer and unsure what all the e-commerce handwaving really means, or you need to produce a basic e-commerce system in a hurry, you need this book.
(Frank Carver - Sheriff,
June 2001)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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Java Server Pages Application Development
by Scott M. Stirling, Andre Lei, Ben Forta, Edwin Smith, Larry Kim, Roger Kerr, David Aden
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Sams
Published: 2000-11-17 |
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One way to start a review of this book is by saying that the contents of the CD-ROM are very interesting.
But more on that later...
The back cover reads "Category: Development" and "User Level: Professional". In this context then, I think this is indeed a very good book. Also, at the time of this writing it is one of the most recent books on JSP 1.1 (there is a misprint right there on the
cover of my copy that reads "JSP 1.2" but that's a typo). Sure there's a JSP 1.2 draft but it is not covered in the book.
The book is about 400 pages long (not too short, not to long IMHO) and it is obviously written by experts. I even like the
succinct explanations of the Internet and how it is NOT synonym with the World Wide Web (WWW): Not only are they not the same
thing, but the Internet is older than the WWW.
Also, Web browsers and Web servers are quickly described while explaining the differences between a Web Server and an Application
Server.
But the meat of the book is of course, JSPs. Here the authors sometimes give (in my opinion) more information (and that is good for me) than is required for (for example)
HTML programmers that want to learn JSP.
JSP in my view, could be a "super HTML" type of markup language, if you use JSP custom tags all the way. So, I don't see
what place the concept of Java Reflection may occupy in a book like this. Also, I think there's no need to get "Under the
Hood" as early as on page 20, where a compiled-to-servlet-JSP is presented as it looks after three different JSP engines went
through it.
During the time that I was reading this book, one day I got back from lunch and there was an ASP/VB programmer looking at
the book. She's not very familiar with Java tech yet, but she had read that Java was supposed to be WORA ("Write Once Run Anywhere").
She then proceeded to ask me "I thought this book was about JSPs. Why does it have Java code called Servlets so early in
the book, but more importantly, the code is supposed to be the same but I see three different versions of it? You mean I have
to learn a different JSP (or Servlet API for that matter) for every server?"
She was confused that there were three different "sets of instructions" for JRun, Resin and Jakarta. It's OK; I cleared
her doubt.
Finally, I don't see why the use and explanation of CSS is needed. Of course it's good programming practice to use CSS but
if a reader is not familiar with it beforehand, she may find it more difficult.
Otherwise this is a fine book that programmers with some experience in Java and HTML should seriously consider.
Finally, the CD-ROM has everything you wanted but were afraid to ask, assuming that you're not yet committed to a development
environment/application server.
It is the best-loaded CD-ROM that I have seen recently in an a book.
(Tony Alicea - sheriff,
March 2001)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Core Servlets and Javaserver Pages: Advanced Technologies, Vol. 2
Marty Hall, Larry Brown, Yaakov Chaikin
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Prentice Hall PTR
Published: 2007-12-01 |
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"Core Servlets and JavaServer Pages, Volume 2: Advanced Technologies" targets developers who already know Java and basic servlets/JSPs.
Note this book's second edition does not cover the latest technologies. It uses J2EE 1.3/1.4 and Struts 1.3.
The main topics are advanced deployment descriptor settings, security, custom tags, filters, event handling and JSTL. Then
there are three very good chapters on Struts 1.3, although I'm not sure what they have to do with "core servlets." The browser
screenshots were good for showing output and the examples were excellent.
As with "Core Java", the 700 page book contains some long classes. I could have done without the complete 5 page deployment
descriptor at the end since it was gradually built up with new additions highlighted. Highlighting does help with spatial
orientation.
I did notice a couple typos in the book. None of these affected the meaning, but it gives you the impression it wasn't proofread
as carefully as other books. And (at least my copy) had a printing error where one page was missing a few lines.
The book mostly pointed out best practices. There were a few exceptions such as one chapter mentioning which jsp page should
establish a database connection. Different chapters had different opinions on whether there should be scriptlets in a JSP
as well.
Overall the book was fine although I would prefer to invest in a different title -- either fully on Struts or fully on servlets/JSPs.
(Jeanne Boyarsky - Sheriff,
February 2008)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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Practical Apache Struts 2 Web 2.0 Projects
Ian Roughley
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Apress
Published: 2007-11-16 |
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"Practical Apache Struts2 Web 2.0 Projects" walks you through developing an app in Struts2. It includes use cases, iterations,
a build process and some unit tests.
A number of other reviews correctly point out this book is not for beginners. You should be familiar with MVC before starting
out. This was ok as I wasn't expecting an "intro to struts 2" book based on the title. The author includes a section on
Hibernate bare essentials to get readers with different experience on the same page.
I found there to be a good balance between how Struts 2.0 works and implementing common things you might actually want to
do in practice. While the book does cover Web 2.0 a bit, this is more of an extra buzzword in the title. The last two chapters
are really the Web 2.0 part -- RSS and AJAX.
The end left me a little off balance. There was a whole chapter of introduction. The end was the AJAX chapter and the immediately
dumped you in the index. A bit of conclusion, or at least a blank page, would have been nice.
Overall, the book was fine. It is good for a "recipes of common tasks" type book once you have read a bit about Struts 2.0.
(Jeanne Boyarsky - Sheriff,
February 2008)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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Struts: Essential Skills
Steven Holzner
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McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Published: 2004-07-29 |
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I've been playing with Struts ever since 1.0 came out. However, I haven't worked with Struts on anything more than simple
applications, which made this book sound like a perfect match for my needs. Especially as it covers Struts 1.2 (beta).
Mister Holzner does a great job explaining certain things that many other resources seem to omit, assuming that the reader
can figure it out on her own (often by reading source code). In general, the book's contents feels like a good match for the
book's stated target audience.
The negative remarks I wrote down while going through the chapters included a lot of tiny issues like not explaining all
attributes (even with a one-sentence mention) of the action mappings in a Struts configuration file. Also, it was weird to
be taught how one uses "javac" -- the book clearly states that working knowledge of Java is assumed.
Furthermore, many example code snippets in the book use horrible package and class names such as "ch03.ch03_05", which makes
it unnecessarily difficult to keep track of which file is which. Also, the decision to employ a custom taglib, <ch03:toppings/>,
just to set up a list of items for testing when a simple scriptlet would do?
Regardless of me whining about the smaller issues, I'd say "Struts: Essential Skills" is a great learning resource for Struts.
It's far from sufficient as a reference, but I've never seen as effective a Struts tutorial than this.
(Lasse Koskela - Bartender,
August 2004)
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JavaServer Pages
Larne Pekowsky
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2003-08-22 |
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This book is geared for web site designers with no Java experience who are interested in understanding how to incorporate
JSP into their web site. Although the book concentrates on incorporating JSPs into a web site it also includes enough information
to allow the non-programmer to do some basic programming.
The first half of the book is a basic overview of JSP with a concentration on using JavaBeans, JSTL, and the expression language.
Anyone who is familiar with ASP or ColdFusion will find this section easy to follow. Each chapter has examples that help
to make the information easier to understand. The second half of the book starts with a brief introduction to the Java programming
language. The book then shows how to write your own JavaBeans. Servlets are discussed along with explaining what an MVC architecture
is using Struts as an example. The second half ends by showing how to develop your own tag libraries.
The author has done a good job of explaining the basics of using JSPs but then he tries to cast too wide a net. Each of
the topics is covered too lightly and will tend to leave the inexperienced reader a bit lost. If you are a web designer and
need to understand how to incorporate Java into your site then this book will be very helpful. Read the first part of the
book in detail and just catch the major themes of the second half and you will be in good shape.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
November 2003)
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JSP: Practical guide for Java Programmers
Robert J. Brunner
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Morgan Kaufmann
Published: 2003-09-24 |
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This is a slim and easy to read book which covers JSP 2.0 in just about the right amount of detail to get a competent Java
programmer up to speed quickly and effectively. As well as JSP there is a also a very brief and shallow introduction to a
few other associated technologies: servlets, CSS etc.
The writing style is polished and comfortable, but a worrying number of typos and other errata have slipped through the editing
process, in particular in the first part of the book. I suggest it would be a good idea to check the associated web site
before relying on the printed code and configuration examples. I'm also uneasy about the choice of example application used
as a case study throughout the book. While everyone is likely to understand the idea of a bank, the examples given neither
make a very convincing bank, nor make particularly good use of JSP technology.
This book will be useful for anyone starting work on a web application project which makes use of JSP 2.0, but who doesn't
want to wade through the specification documents. If your project still runs on an older version, this book will only be frustrating,
but it might just tempt you to upgrade.
(Frank Carver - Sheriff,
November 2003)
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The Struts Framework: Practical Guide for Programmers
Sue Spielman
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Morgan Kaufmann
Published: 2002-10-01 |
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I found this book's introduction to Struts to be inadequate. I have a very strong understanding of JSP and Servlets and
a cursory understanding of the MVC design pattern. After reading the first two chapters I was quite confused about the general
workings of Struts. A small, trivial Struts application to introduce the reader to the pieces and how they are inter-related
would have increased the understandability ten-fold. However, that might have cut into the author's allowed page count: realize
this book is 137 pages soaking wet (including the appendix and index... I don't recommend actually soaking the book). After
getting a better understanding of Struts from another source, I came back to learn the details.
The author does an good job of explaining how best to use each part of the Struts Framework (that's where the "practical
guide" part comes into play). More importantly she notes the possible hang-ups that normally you'd only learn through a bad
experience (Don't use instance variables in your Action classes. Don't worry if you forget this rule now -- after you've read
the book, this and other gotchas are tattooed inside your head).
Overall I'd say this is a very good resource. You'll need to go elsewhere to introduce yourself to Struts (find a nicely
explained step-by-step tutorial), but after that, this book will be able to take you most of the way to a well-designed Struts
implementation.
(Jessica Sant - Bartender,
May 2003)
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Programming Jakarta Struts
Chuck Cavaness
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O'Reilly
Published: 2002-11-13 |
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The target for the book is any experienced Java developer who is interested in Struts but has little or no experience with
Struts. The book starts with an explanation of why Struts is a "good thing" and shows how Struts fits into a web architecture.
The author then gives an explanation of each of the pieces of the Struts architecture and demonstrates a simple application.
Although the explanations were clear, I felt that the author was making the architecture overly complicated by explaining
things out of order. A diagram showing the interrelationships of the different Struts classes and config files would have
been helpful. The author covers all the expected topics such as internationalization, exception handling, logging, and the
Struts tag libraries. The chapter on the Struts tag libraries could have used more examples to make the explanations clearer.
The book concentrates on Struts 1.1 and the author does a nice job of explaining the changes from the 1.0 version and the
features available in the new version. The chapter on the new Validator framework is clear and the examples are on target.
The chapter on Tiles is short but the author does a great job of explaining how it fits into the Struts architecture. The
chapter on performance seemed completely unnecessary since there was nothing in it specific to Struts. Overall this book
is a good addition to the Struts library. The book has some shortcomings but it provides a good deal of value.
(Thomas Paul - Sheriff,
February 2003)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Professional Java Servlets 2.3
by John Bell, Tony Loton, et. al.
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Peer Information
Published: 2002-01 |
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When I sat down to write this review I knew how a teacher must feel when he had to give a star student a bad score.
This book has all the information you need to write the perfect application that is scalable, secure, maintainable and perfectly
debugged based on the Java Servlet 2.3 API. The authors obviously know their stuff and they individually share their knowledge
clearly and understandable with the reader. Individually however, is exactly where my problem lies with this book. The book
would have worked so much better for me if it had a golden thread running trough it, if a sample application was described
in the beginning of the book for instance and the authors each contributed to one final perfect solution.
To be able to try all the example code one has to download megabytes of stuff from the internet. What bugged me most about
that was that URL's for downloading were scattered all over the book. I for one download and install all the required stuff
before I attack a book. Please Wrox, a separate Appendix.
Talking about Appendices, Appendix B (HTTP Reference) and Appendix C (Servlets API Reference) are great!
This book deserves a better score, it provides me with all the info I need, but I am afraid the way it is told as a whole
stops me from obtaining the in-dept understanding of Servlets I was hoping to find through this book.
Still worth buying though.
(Johannes de Jong - Bartender,
May 2002)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Early Adopter JSP Standard Tag Library
by Jayson Falkner, James Hart, Richard Huss, Cindy Nordahl
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Peer Information Inc.
Published: 2002-01 |
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The JSTL is currently in its Early Access stage (JSR-052), and it is aiming for a common, standard set of custom tag libraries
such as Core Library (iteration, conditional, processing, and expression language support: SPEL, ECMAScript, JPath, JXPath),
Formatting Library (support for I18N, local formatting and parsing), SQL Library (for database access from JSP), and XML Processing
(tags for parsing and XSL transformation of XML documents), all of which are covered by this book.
So far, this is the only book available for this new, exciting topic. If you are interested in JSTL (you should be if you
are a web application developer), this book will give you a great opportunity to get a practical overview of the topic. You
don't have to wait a few more months to start exploring and using the JSTL. Of course, the book does not provide all the nitty-gritty
stuff, but it will definitely help you to understand the topic by showing the usage of the tags thru a web application.The
book does not include an index. The book assumes that you have a working knowledge of JSP.
(Ersin Eser - Bartender,
February 2002)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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Developing Java Servlets
by James Goodwill
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Sams
Published: 2001-05-31 |
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If you are in a position where you need to do development involving Java Servlets, (as many web developers these days are
now finding themselves in), "Developing Java Servlets Second Edition" by James Goodwill is a book you may consider looking
at. For those that are interested in just learning more about server-side Java programming (with focus on developing Java
Servlets), consider looking at and possibly adding this text to your collection.
The material is aimed at individuals who are already comfortable developing in Java, but want more information or examples
on server-side Java programming. For individuals new to Java Servlets, the book does have a nice overview of Servlets as well
as good information presented on Servlet Architecture. Servlet basics are presented as are some examples. Good example code
is a key contributing factor to making any book focused on software development useful. This book provides a significant amount
of example code, but unfortunately, lacks a CD-ROM. Although a little tricky to find, the source code to the examples is available
on-line.
This book attempts to cover a little too much information but does succeed in providing some good reading centered around
Servlets on sessions, tunneling, security, and LDAP. It also contains material which may be new to this edition on JavaMail,
XML, JSP, EJB, and wireless Servlets with WML/WMLScripts. Overall a useful book to read if you are interested in Java Servlet
development with code examples or just an overview of server-side Java programming.
(John Ternlund - Ranch Hand,
September 2001)
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Sams
Published: 2001-05-31 |
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Again, good marks on Amazon and I've read only the first two chapters A second edition is now available.
(Paul Wheaton ,
January 2000)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Inside Servlets: Server-Side Programming for the Java
by Dustin R. Callaway
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2001-05-14 |
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A great book for novice web developers, Inside Servlets( 2nd Edition ) is a well written Servlet development guide. As the
publisher's web site says, it is an excellent resource for "programmers and consultants who desire to learn Web development
fundamentals in addition to server-side Java programming. Much of this audience likely consists of current client/server programmers."
The chapters are categorized into three major sections - Introduction to Web development, Introduction to Servlets and Advanced
Servlet concepts. There is a great deal of academic material in the introductory chapters - pages of information about HTML,
Brief History of the Web, Web Servers, Web browsers, Networking, Ports, Sockets, Firewalls etc that may be too much of a digression
for a not-so-newbie programmer. The very first Servlet program appears only after Chapter 4. I found the fat appendix containing
Servlet API documentation - one that is freely available on the web - completely unnecessary. The section on Advanced Servlet
Concepts completely ignores to mention latest developments in Servlet technology - integration with XML and Servlet based
frameworks such as ECS and Cocoon. Overall, it is a book for beginners, not for professional Servlet developers.
(Ajith Kallambella - sheriff,
June 2001)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Mastering JSP Custom Tags and Tag Libraries
James Goodwill
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Wiley
Published: 2002-02-15 |
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Despite its title, only five (out of twenty-eight) chapters of this book actually discuss the details of writing custom JSP
tag libraries. The first four chapters go over setting up Tomcat 4.0 and the basics of servlets and JSPs. The remaining chapters
are really more of a desktop reference covering the Jakarta Taglibs project and the JSP Standard Tag Library (JSTL) using
the "In a Nutshell" format. There are numerous examples but most are short and very similar to those you'll find in the online
documentation. Since Taglibs and JSTL are constantly evolving, the reference material will quickly become outdated--some
of it already is.
The discussion on writing custom tag libraries is fairly comprehensive but I didn't care for the organization of the topics.
I prefer a "cookbook" type approach when learning these things but the book had me jumping from one section to another, skipping
ahead to find details and then backtracking to the examples. There are also a number of typos and errors in the text that
might confuse the unwary novice. One example instructs you to put a JAR and its TLD in the WEB-INF/lib directory whereas
the web.xml specifies "WEB-INF" which makes Tomcat unable to start the web application. This had me cursing Tomcat for a
while until a colleague suggested I look in the log files.
If you prefer "Nutshell"-type books to online references, you might find this book useful for a while.
(Junilu Lacar - Bartender,
September 2002)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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J2EE FrontEnd Technologies: A Programmer's Guide to Servlets, JavaServer Pages, and Enterprise JavaBeans
by Lennart Jorelid
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Apress
Published: 2001-12-15 |
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"J2EE FrontEnd Technologies" refers to itself as a "programmer's guide" and that is probably the best description of it.
While it also claims to be "chock full of code examples" and contains "what you need to know," it falls short in both these
areas. What you will find is a fairly detailed and yet limited explanation of the three major J2EE technologies, Servlets,
JSPs, and EJBs. Although you will find extensive information for these three areas, there are many details left out and there
is little attempt made to tie the three pieces together. For example, you will not find any examples of linking servlets and
JSPs other than by using the Struts framework. You will also find no more than a brief mention of message driven EJBs. There
are numerous UML diagrams throughout the book but in many cases they add little beyond what you can get from looking at the
APIs. The examples in the book tend to be overly simplistic, in some cases wasting many pages to show an example that could
have been summarized in a few lines of code. The best section of the book is the section on EJBs. The author's detailed description
of EJB deployment descriptors is better than what you will find in most EJB books. This section also features the most complete
examples found in the book. Overall this book does contain value, although it fails as an introduction or tutorial on the
technologies that it covers.
(Thomas Paul - bartender,
February 2002)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
More info at Amazon.co.uk
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Servlets and JSP: The J2EE Web Tier
Jayson Falkner, Kevin R. Jones
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Addison-Wesley Professional
Published: 2003-09-29 |
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Addison-Wesley has released yet another book covering Java Servlets and JavaServer Pages appropriately titled Servlets and
JSP: The J2EE Web Tier. Jayson Falkner is known for several other books covering JSP and the JSTL while Kevin R Jones breaks
into the J2EE scene with this book.
This book starts out like any other J2EE book for beginners covering topics like CGI, the HTTP protocol, and why we need
a technology like Servlets and JSP. It then goes on to discuss how a web container like Tomcat works and how to deploy a
simple "Hello World" servlet. But then, the book makes a startling jump to writing a servlet to upload a file. While this
may be something most people will want to know how to do, I didn?t find it appropriate to discuss so early.
The rest of the book is pretty much a regurgitation of every other book on Servlets and JSP. The book promises to delve
into the features of the new J2EE specification and inadequately does so by briefly discussing the Expression Language new
to JSP in the same chapter that JavaBeans are discussed.
The book ends in classic fashion with Database access and DataSources which was highly expected. You can't have a Servlets
and JSP book without this chapter.
All and all I would say that I was pretty disappointed in this book. If you are new to Servlets and JavaServer Pages I would
suggest leaving this book on the shelf.
(Gregg Bolinger - Bartender,
October 2003)
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More info at Amazon.com ||
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Instant JavaServer Pages
by Paul Tremblett
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McGraw-Hill Companies
Published: 2000-05-30 |
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JavaServer Pages (JSP) is one of the hot, new Java technologies. For the experienced Java developer, JSP is not difficult
to learn. For the inexperienced Java developer, JSP is not a good place to start. Which leads me to wonder who might be the
target audience for "Instant JavaServer Pages". There are serious holes in what this book covers that will leave most developers
looking for additional resources. Some examples:
* The author spends less than one page discussing taglibs, most of which is simply taken from the version 1.1 specification.
* Although using JSP with XML is prominently featured on the cover of the book, the author spends more pages discussing how
to install and configure PostgreSQL to run the examples than he does on XML.
* On page 4, the author tells us that JSP can be used to generate WML but no examples of this are to be found in the book.
If this book was 200 pages long I might understand this missing material, but the author spends 500 pages explaining no
more than the basics of using JSP. That being said, the book is not all bad. The author repeatedly demonstrates the proper
use of JSP for creating a user interface. His many examples stress that business logic should be placed in Java Beans and
those beans invoked by a JSP. The fact is, however, that although the author does well with the material covered, there is
too much material left out for me to recommend this book.
(Thomas Paul - bartender,
March 2001)
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Java Servlets
by Karl Moss
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McGraw-Hill Companies
Published: 1999-06 |
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I read this book in 1998 when I was learning servlets. This is an overall good book, especially with the aspects of database
stuff, multi-threading and big loads. I would probably put it in the recommended section, but it has been over a year since
I looked at and I don't have it anymore. I would want to at least browse it again to give a good review. A second edition
is now available.
(Paul Wheaton ,
January 2000)
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Core JSP
by Damon Hougland, Aaron Tavistock
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Prentice Hall PTR
Published: 2000-10-05 |
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I would rate this book as below average. I found a lot of typos, confusing notation and words used too loosely. Terms like
Java code (why not spell it as Servlet), JSP, Server are used interchangeably. I guess the authors were minimizing the use
of the word Servlet since this book is titled as Core JSP. The CD has all the code, which is a plus so you don't have to be
online or download from the web or search for the URL to download. But, out of the box the code hardly works. I had to do
some patching to get the examples (though small) to work with Tomcat (changes are not related to Tomcat). JSP deployment is
not discussed in detail. The book does an okay job on JavaBeans, JDBC, XML and JNDI. These concepts are explained as needed,
so you don't have to know these before you use this book. I did like the Custom Tags chapter; however, I don't think this
book justifies the cost I would pay.
(Madhav Lakkapragada - bartender,
April 2001)
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Java for the Web with Servlets, JSP, and EJB
by Budi Kurniawan
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Sams
Published: 2002-04-22 |
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This book can be used to learn all the basics of Servlets, JSP's and EJB's. It provides great coverage of all the basics.
From that point on it fails! Anyone creating a system using most of the methodologies shown in this book will be disappointed.
It constantly demonstrates the things not to do. Especially in respect to DataBase connections. A mention is made on one page
of DB Pools and JNDI DataSource then, every example has connections made in a haphazard fashion. JSP TagLibs are introduced
and immediately follow by JSP Examples filled with scripting, including making connections to a database. In the DBBean example,
the only thing preventing serious concurrency problems with the connection is the fact that the bean is placed in page scope.
This causes the connection to be recreated with each page request. When EJB's where introduced, I felt sure the author would
use a JNDI DataSource, instead JNDI is used to lookup the Database information (such as the URL) and make individual connections.
No attempt is made to demonstrate most of the performance enhancing patterns that can be used with EJB's. Not a book to help
learn to Build Scalable Systems!
(Carl Trusiak - Sheriff,
June 2002)
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XML, XSLT, Java, and JSP: A Case Study in Developing a Web Application
by Westy Rockwell
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New Riders Press
Published: 2001-07-19 |
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There are some books that are published that you wonder why the publisher went through the exercise. New Riders should have
rejected this manuscript. It claims to be a case study of XML, XSLT, and JSP but it isn't. It is a confused and confusing
discussion of the author playing around with technology.
The author wanted to try out some ideas so he decided to write a chat program. But there is no real design effort (you won't
find a single UML diagram anywhere) so it is difficult to understand precisely what the application is supposed to look like.
Without any real design, the application ends up with one servlet of over 50 pages and another of over 40 pages in length.
(The book is inflated with 300 pages of source listings that are unreadable.) As a case study in how to do bad design and
write awful code, the book can serve as a warning perhaps. As far as actually trying to explain any of this technology, the
author admits that isn't the purpose of the book. In a case study you like to hear of problems encountered or the different
solutions attempted but you won't. No mention is made of security or performance. The code itself is useless and can't be
used in other applications because it is so poorly designed. The author admits that huge chunks of code need to be refactored.
Overall this book fails to provide any real value.
(Thomas Paul - Bartender,
September 2001)
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