[Jython/Java] Which books, which IDEs, which other tools?

[Alex Martelli]

"F. GEIGER" <fgeiger at datec.at> wrote in message
news:a2ocnj$qci$1 at rex.ip-plus.net...
> I hope this is not too OT, but since Jython *is* Python and since I guess
> that many Java programmers hang around here too, I dare to post the

I think discussing Jython issues is completely on-topic here.


> 4) Which books do you recommend on Java? I'd like to read about
everything,
> not just some core stuff. For Jython I've already ordered Bill's book. Are
> books in a style "Java for <whatever> programmers" advisable?

I like O'Reilly series, http://java.oreilly.com/ -- if you get all of the
40 or so books listed here you still won't "read about *everything*", but
it would be a start.

Most people will prefer NOT to read about _everything_ -- you may want
to know all of the details of DB programming AND graphics AND I/O AND
criptography AND JSP AND RMI (etc, etc, ad nauseam), but most people, I
think, will be happier with shallower overviews of most areas and only
get the specialized books for areas they actually need to work on --
e.g., Learning Java if you need a hand-holding tutorial, Java in a
Nutshell and the Java Cookbook for sure, probably the other Nutshell
books (Examples, Foundation Classes, Enterprise) for useful overviews,
Jython Essentials as soon as it comes off the presses (very nice book),
but then, beyond this, only the specific subjects you need to work
on in depth (be that Swing, Enterprise JavaBeans, Threads, JSP, RMI,
SAX2, Wireless Java, Internationalization, 2D Graphics, whatever).

Sorry about not answering the rest, but I haven't yet found any
specific IDE or tool making me more productive than VIM and a JDK
(Sun's or IBM's) -- but that's no doubt because I'm a text-console-
oriented dinosaur (you could put it down to me having done little,
professionally, with Java -- but I feel much the same about C, C++
and Python, which I have had occasion to use much more extensively...
a good editor, VIM being my choice, and typical text-console tools,
are tendentially my "non-I DE" of choice in each case:-).


Alex