Effective Java Author: Joshua Bloch | Language: English | ISBN:
B000WJOUPA | Format: EPUB
Effective Java Description
Are you looking for a deeper understanding of the Java™ programming language so that you can write code that is clearer, more correct, more robust, and more reusable? Look no further! Effective Java™, Second Edition, brings together seventy-eight indispensable programmer’s rules of thumb: working, best-practice solutions for the programming challenges you encounter every day.
This highly anticipated new edition of the classic, Jolt Award-winning work has been thoroughly updated to cover Java SE 5 and Java SE 6 features introduced since the first edition. Bloch explores new design patterns and language idioms, showing you how to make the most of features ranging from generics to enums, annotations to autoboxing.
Each chapter in the book consists of several “items” presented in the form of a short, standalone essay that provides specific advice, insight into Java platform subtleties, and outstanding code examples. The comprehensive descriptions and explanations for each item illuminate what to do, what not to do, and why.
Highlights include:
New coverage of generics, enums, annotations, autoboxing, the for-each loop, varargs, concurrency utilities, and much more
Updated techniques and best practices on classic topics, including objects, classes, libraries, methods, and serialization
How to avoid the traps and pitfalls of commonly misunderstood subtleties of the language
Focus on the language and its most fundamental libraries: java.lang, java.util, and, to a lesser extent, java.util.concurrent and java.io
Simply put, Effective Java™, Second Edition, presents the most practical, authoritative guidelines available for writing efficient, well-designed programs.
- File Size: 1318 KB
- Print Length: 374 pages
- Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0321356683
- Simultaneous Device Usage: Up to 5 simultaneous devices, per publisher limits
- Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional; 2 edition (May 8, 2008)
- Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
- Language: English
- ASIN: B000WJOUPA
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #17,815 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #1
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Computers & Technology > Programming > Java - #9
in Books > Computers & Technology > Programming > Languages & Tools > Java - #15
in Books > Computers & Technology > Programming > Software Design, Testing & Engineering > Object-Oriented Design
- #1
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Computers & Technology > Programming > Java - #9
in Books > Computers & Technology > Programming > Languages & Tools > Java - #15
in Books > Computers & Technology > Programming > Software Design, Testing & Engineering > Object-Oriented Design
Effective Java, Second Edition by Joshua Bloch is certainly the best Java book I have read in a long time. As a disclaimer, I never read the first edition and I am thus unable to compare the two editions. Effective Java, Second Edition is a mostly easy and fun read providing you with many insights and best practices on how to use Java effectively. It certainly is not a book for the beginner just starting out learning Java. For that purpose you may want to take a look at Thinking in Java by Bruce Eckel instead. Nevertheless, Effective Java would serve as an excellent follow-up.
In Effective Java, Joshua Bloch does a great job describing best practices that you as developer will find useful on a daily basis. For example, I really found his description of the builder pattern (Item 2, page 11) quite interesting. Another Item that fascinated me, was Item 15 (page 73) - "Minimize mutability". Both items are part of a broader theme throughout the book that promotes creating code that is as immutable as possible. In that regard, reading the book will enable you to simply write better and safer code. The book also leads the way towards promoting functional programming techniques which will come in quite handily when developing multithreaded applications. Therefore, as a next book I may recommend reading Java Concurrency in Practice by Brian Goetz.
Even for the experienced Java developer, Effective Java contains quite a few little eye openers. I for example was previously unaware of how static factory methods can simplify the creation of parameterized type instances using "type inference". This is described on page 9 (Item 1).
If you want to know the good things about this book, read the other reviews, many of which I agree with. This review just states what makes the book 4 stars for me instead of 5, because none of the other reviews I read pointed them out.
Most of the items in book are very good, a few are great and well worth the price of the book and the time it takes to read it, but some have to be taken with a grain of salt. They probably make sense if you come from the background of working on the Java API team, as the author does, but wouldn't make much sense on any of the projects I have worked on. The problem is that all are presented as universal truths and only through experience can you tell which truly are and which can be ignored.
I also feel that some of the items need to be tempered with just plain practical usefulness. I know that programming a certain way makes the code bullet proof from certain errors by not compiling if those errors are introduced, but if the code is quite a bit harder to understand and those errors are rare, is it really worth it? Also, some of the items are written as if everything you are writing is being published and supported publicly. If code and interfaces are just being used between two teams within the company, or even just on a single team, some of the logic used to describe why items are important don't make as much sense. Again, I just feel that these are something that make complete sense if you are writing on the API team, but not necessarily in every other case.
My final small complaint is that the author tends to be a bit wordy on some of the items, fully explaining out every nuance of the wrong way to do it, which tends to create noise in some explanations that are pretty heavy anyway.
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