Struts: Essential Skills
ASIN: 0072256591
Average Customer Review: 3.5, based on 5 reviews.
Customer reviews (5 of 5)
Really Covers the Topic, 2005-10-19, Rating: 5.
I was new to Struts and found the modules and examples really helped me get up to speed fast. Clear writing and helpful information throughout. The book is very thorough and up to date. I'm glad I bought it--recommended!
Great book on Struts, 2005-10-11, Rating: 5.
This book cut through the mysteries of Struts for me. Very helpful and clear. It's written step by step, with code that increments, and that worked perfectly for me.
Not Ready For Prime Time, 2005-09-07, Rating: 1.
The number of complaints I have for this book are many: important details missing, typographical errors in the CODE, poor naming conventions for classes, code snippets lack comments, code examples lack filenames (making browsing the book for example code nearly impossible), and the lack of a complete useful example. The only saving grace for this book is that I can't name the perfect Struts book (every book I have looked at has serious flaws).
Can the examples be any more Confusing???, 2005-07-29, Rating: 2.
This book must have been rushed to market. Normally, I buy a tech book and count the examples to get me through the more complicated material. I find it easier to simply read the code sometimes vs spending my time reading what the author has to say. Well, with Struts Essentials that isn't an option. The examples are horribly confusing.
For each sample app the author just used a naming scheme of chapter number and then he adds an incrementing number at the end of the chapter name to get the class/file name.
The index page would be ch04_01.jsp. An Action class would be ch04_02.java. A form would be ch04_03.java. And a results jsp page would be ch04_04.jsp.
What a bad idea. So then try to imagine learning how to tie the Struts concepts together with writing a struts-config.xml. It's very ugly and so very confusing.
Insult to injury, I've found a number or errata but there isn't anywhere on the books site to let the author/publisher know.
Buy a different book.
For each sample app the author just used a naming scheme of chapter number and then he adds an incrementing number at the end of the chapter name to get the class/file name.
The index page would be ch04_01.jsp. An Action class would be ch04_02.java. A form would be ch04_03.java. And a results jsp page would be ch04_04.jsp.
What a bad idea. So then try to imagine learning how to tie the Struts concepts together with writing a struts-config.xml. It's very ugly and so very confusing.
Insult to injury, I've found a number or errata but there isn't anywhere on the books site to let the author/publisher know.
Buy a different book.
Great tutorial, not much of a reference though, 2004-08-15, Rating: 4.
I've been playing with Struts ever since 1.0 came out. However, I haven't worked with Struts on anything more than simple applications, which made this book sound like a perfect match for my needs. Especially as it covers Struts 1.2 (beta).
Mister Holzner does a great job explaining certain things that many other resources seem to omit, assuming that the reader can figure it out on her own (often by reading source code). In general, the book's contents feels like a good match for the book's stated target audience.
The negative remarks I wrote down while going through the chapters included a lot of tiny issues like not explaining all attributes (even with a one-sentence mention) of the action mappings in a Struts configuration file. Also, it was weird to be taught how one uses "javac" -- the book clearly states that working knowledge of Java is assumed.
Furthermore, many example code snippets in the book use horrible package and class names such as "ch03.ch03_05", which makes it unnecessarily difficult to keep track of which file is which. Also, the decision to employ a custom taglib, <ch03:toppings/>, just to set up a list of items for testing when a simple scriptlet would do?
Regardless of me whining about the smaller issues, I'd say "Struts: Essential Skills" is a great learning resource for Struts. It's far from sufficient as a reference, but I've never seen as effective a Struts tutorial than this.
Mister Holzner does a great job explaining certain things that many other resources seem to omit, assuming that the reader can figure it out on her own (often by reading source code). In general, the book's contents feels like a good match for the book's stated target audience.
The negative remarks I wrote down while going through the chapters included a lot of tiny issues like not explaining all attributes (even with a one-sentence mention) of the action mappings in a Struts configuration file. Also, it was weird to be taught how one uses "javac" -- the book clearly states that working knowledge of Java is assumed.
Furthermore, many example code snippets in the book use horrible package and class names such as "ch03.ch03_05", which makes it unnecessarily difficult to keep track of which file is which. Also, the decision to employ a custom taglib, <ch03:toppings/>, just to set up a list of items for testing when a simple scriptlet would do?
Regardless of me whining about the smaller issues, I'd say "Struts: Essential Skills" is a great learning resource for Struts. It's far from sufficient as a reference, but I've never seen as effective a Struts tutorial than this.
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