Sidious

Hey guys last year in grade 11 we did VB6 (nasty I know)... this year in grade 12 we are goin to to java.... and I want a good book on Java. Got any suggestions?

I don't want a refernece book, more a tutorial book. and preferable with compiler software unless somebody knows some good freeware compliers.

Thanks!

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As presented to the Continental Congress, Thomas Jefferson’s version of the Declaration was made up of 1,817 words; Congress made 68 changes, cutting 480 words, which left the finalized document’s word count at 1,337 words.
--> Thats right... The Declaration of Independence contains 1337 words!

cgrado

I use BlueJ. Good program. And right now we're using this java book (which i don't have with me) and i'll try to remember the name. Fundamentals of Java- http://www.course.com/catalog/produc...=0-619-05963-X <-I think that's the book we use.

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TriplePlay

A decent free compiler is jGrasp, that's what we use in the Java class I'm taking now. I hear more experienced users prefer Eclipse, but I also hear it's more complicated somehow (I've never used it), but it does have better features. I have and use jGrasp.

And our book is called "Big Java." It seems good, but our teacher is doing a poor job of teaching and explaining things to us so we must learn on our own which slows the class down a bit.

And I remember VB6, I did that last year. Java this year though

Good luck, and don't give up no matter how frustrating it is sometimes

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Sidious

Are these books refernce books though? I'm looking for more of a Tutorial book. I'd use online tutorials but the books are much more organized and usually are better coding overall for techniques learned.

__________________
Crucial Ballistix Club

As presented to the Continental Congress, Thomas Jefferson’s version of the Declaration was made up of 1,817 words; Congress made 68 changes, cutting 480 words, which left the finalized document’s word count at 1,337 words.
--> Thats right... The Declaration of Independence contains 1337 words!

C-bro

For Java I use nothing but Netbeans IDE that you can download with the SDK. Gorgeous environment that basically syntax-checks in real time so you rarely, if ever, get compile errors.

As far as a book, using the online tutorials put out by Sun should be sufficient.

http://java.sun.com/docs/books/tutorial/index.html

Also, the API spec will be your Java bible. So helpful

http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/api/

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TriplePlay

Oh yeah, forgot about Netbeans C-bro mentioned. That's a good one too. I haven't used it much, but I hear it's good.


And yes, Big Java is divided into chapters which build on each other, going through how to do everything. It even shows example programs in the book, and all the coding is commented.

The only issue I had was that on their website they link to downloads for example programs that answer the practice programs for you to code yourself in the book, but the links are dead so if you can't figure out the answer you will have to ask someone for help.

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Sidious

with netbeans, if I download from the main download on their homepage, do I still need more files or anything? Can you tell me exactly what to download? I'm used to spoon feeding from VB6 :P

__________________
Crucial Ballistix Club

As presented to the Continental Congress, Thomas Jefferson’s version of the Declaration was made up of 1,817 words; Congress made 68 changes, cutting 480 words, which left the finalized document’s word count at 1,337 words.
--> Thats right... The Declaration of Independence contains 1337 words!

cgrado

As you use more classes, you will have to download those files. Very small though, come in ".jar" files (javas version of zip) and you import them to netbeans (if it's like bluej) and you can then use the classes.

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TriplePlay

Yeah, like cgrado says you may have to download those .jar files and import them. In jGrasp it's under Settings > Path/Classpath > Workspace > Classpaths tab

I don't really do Java all that much at home, since I'm really still learning it and it's a lot easier to just do it at school in class when others are there to help and solve problems together. So I don't have lots imported, just TerminalIO and BreezySwing. You'll definitely want TerminalIO, unless you feel the need to use Scanner for some reason... >_>

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cgrado

But JOptionPane is so much cooler! Lol, i don't even have all of it down.

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