Subscriber Reviews

Average Rating:  Based on 68 Ratings

"It's a good book, and thorough." - by Anonymous on 12-JUL-2012
Reviewer Rating:
This is a very useful collection of techniques and strategies for designing classes, methods, and APIs in Java.  I'm sure I will be referring to this on an ongoing basis, and I look forward to future editions.

My complaints:

- The ordering of the Items can be frustrating when in the middle of one item we are referred to another in a completely different part of the book, and the discussion assumes that other item has already been read and digested.  I would hope that the material could be ordered a bit more logically.

- The style, while it has enjoyable humorous moments, is very, very dense and can be at times off-putting to the reader.  It can almost seem like the reader is being lectured *at*.

In conclusion, this volume is an immense resource and I am grateful to have been able to read it.  Thanks, Josh!
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"My all time favorite book" - by Anonymous on 03-FEB-2012
Reviewer Rating:
It goes over many different areas in Java, and captures some of the most elegant solutions to common day to day problems most developers encounter. Highly Recommended..
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" Good Book" - by Shamal Jayakody on 12-OCT-2011
Reviewer Rating:
One of the best Books on good programming practices. Joshua Bloch was a good PhD Student at Carnegie Mellon. He developed Collections framework for Java at Sun. It may be over-designed.
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"Effectiv Java" - by Anonymous on 25-AUG-2011
Reviewer Rating:
Gives good explanations.
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"From proficient to expert: read this book!" - by Christopher on 18-FEB-2011
Reviewer Rating:
Having coded in Java for many years, I would consider myself an expert.  I read the first edition of this book a long time ago and felt I knew quite a bit.  When I first saw this book, I scanned the contents and thought, "I know this stuff - little difference from the first edition".

However, knowing that Joshua Bloch is a Java Guru and has a very readable and enjoyable style, and having very much enjoyed the first edition, I thought I would give it a try anyway.

Was I surprised.  While there are places where I have said to myself "I know this", there were many more places where I said, "Huh...I did not know this.  Good thing I'm reading this".  There truly are gold nuggets of knowledge in here.  If you are a serious Java coder who really wants to know the best way to use the language, you cannot avoid this book--even if you have read the first edition.  Joshua has added advice due to the language changes since 1.5 and has other advice as well.  And you need to read every word, both as a refresher (I didn't forget some points) and as an upgrade due to the growth in the language.

In fact, some of the advice here transcends languages can could be applied to .Net and other languages.  But all-in-all this is a Java focused book and worth the time to read.  In fact, I am certain you will need to read it more than once to soak it all in thoroughly.  And if you don't, you will want to refer to it several times in the coming years.
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