Architects of buildings and architects of software have more in common than most people think. Both professions require attention to detail, and both practitioners will see their work collapse around them if they make too many mistakes. It's impossible to imagine a world in which buildings get built without blueprints, but it's still common for software applications to be designed and built without blueprints, or in this case, design patterns. A software design pattern can be identified as "a recurring solution to a recurring problem." Using design patterns for software development makes sense in the same way that architectural design patterns make sense--if it works well in one place, why not use it in another? But developers have had enough of books that simply catalog design patterns without extending into new areas, and books that are so theoretical that you can't actually do anything better after reading them than you could before you started. Crawford and Kaplan's J2EE Design Patterns approaches the subject in a unique, highly practical and pragmatic way. Rather than simply present another catalog of design patterns, the authors broaden the scope by discussing ways to choose design patterns when building an enterprise application from scratch, looking closely at the real world tradeoffs that Java developers must weigh when architecting their applications. Then they go on to show how to apply the patterns when writing realworld software. They also extend design patterns into areas not covered in other books, presenting original patterns for data modeling, transaction / process modeling, and interoperability. J2EE Design Patterns offers extensive coverage of the five problem areas enterprise developers face:

• Maintenance (Extensibility)

• Performance (System Scalability)

• Data Modeling (Business Object Modeling)

• Transactions (process Modeling)

• Messaging (Interoperability)

And with its careful balance between theory and practice, J2EE Design Patterns will give developers new to the Java enterprise development arena a solid understanding of how to approach a wide variety of architectural and procedural problems, and will give experienced J2EE pros an opportunity to extend and improve on their existing experience.

Amazon.com® Reader Reviews (Ranked by Helpfulness)

Average Amazon.com® Rating:  Based on 7 Ratings

For beginners only. Nothing new. - 2004-04-07
Reviewer Rating:
Old wine in a new bottle. Put simply there's nothing new in this book.

If you are just beginning to wade through the vast land of J2EE, you will find lots of introductory material to help you get started. The preface pronounces the audience as Java-aware readers who may not be fluent with J2EE technology stack. Beginners will appreciate the slow pace, logically ordered chapters, thoroughly descriptive background information on every pattern presented and an entire chapter dedicated to UML. However, if you are familiar with the core J2EE patterns published by Sun, there aren't a lot of things in this book that will interest you. Some things worth mentioning are - strategies for content caching, Serizized entity strategy for rapid development, and use of soft references for being thrifty on memory usage. The chapter on Enterprise Messaging Patterns is particularly interesting since it is an area that has attracted some interest lately.

Why another book on patterns? The bookshelves are already packed with several noteworthy titles on this subject and it is only natural to expect to see something new in new titles. This book is a far cry from "CoreJ2EE Patterns" or even the "Java Enterprise Best Practices" from the same publisher.

They could have done a better job by cutting down on teaching the basics and including all of Core J2ee patterns. ACID transaction pattern isn't a pattern at all, but just a fundamental concept. The selection of best practices covered seems arbitrary at best.

- Ajith Kallambella

Average at best - 2004-05-11
Reviewer Rating:
There is nothing remarkable about this book. It loses momentum about halfway through. It isn't a big book and there doesn't seem to be much depth in the coverage. Look else where.

Book review of J2EE Design Pattern - 2005-03-02
Reviewer Rating:
It's good for me because I'm still a beginner of J2EE, its focus on using servlet, jsp and JavaBeanIt's good for me because I'm still a beginner of J2EE, it focuses the patterns on using Servlet, JSP and EJB, it told that how to determine and improve scalability and extensibility, and how to model and implement the system. It is used UML diagram for represent the pattern; some of example covers few chapters to let the content easy to study, some of code is very common for let reader reuse in different application.

-calendarw

a review of J2EE Design Patterns - 2005-02-08
Reviewer Rating:
There are a large number of Design Patterns books available in the industry over the last decade. Crawford and Kaplan's J2EE Design Patterns offers a fresh look at the subject in both a practical and readable manner. Instead of just another catalog of design patterns, it provides insight into the real world scenarios of where these patterns can be employed. From a J2EE designer perspective, this book is a great addition to the study desk.

Good for understanding basics - Poor explanation and repetitive - 2006-01-21
Reviewer Rating:
This book could be an introductory book on understanding J2EE design and guiding principles but beyond that you don't find much help. The book has poor editing and repetitive style of explaining concepts which annoys experienced J2EE developers. If you are looking for J2EE patterns to support real-world implementation with exhaustive details then you must consider reading Core J2EE Patterns (Alur), Core Security Patterns (Steel) and Enterprise Integration Patterns (Houpe).

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