The Open Source Zone

Although a bit out of date, this book is a great introduction to the Jakarta Commons libraries.
The Jakarta Commons libraries are an invaluable resource for the Java programmer. So many holes in the Java class libraries are covered by Commons, that it can become an inseparable part of any Java code. As a Java programmer, I recognized such utilities and code fragments, found in the commons libraries, that I used to implement over and over again on my past various projects.
No more! Commons is to the rescue, and much tested, working code can now be reused.
The book itself follows some of the major libraries: Strings, IO, Templates, Networking, Collections and more.
Some of the covered libraries are not any longer part of the Jakarta Commons (Velocity), and others are missing (commons-jdbc). It would be great to have a new edition for this book.
But even so, the book provides a structural, well defined review of the most interesting features in these libraries. Written in an easy to follow language, having simple yet clear examples and making a point on where and why Jakarta Commons is a good choice.
Many of the features are not well presented in the Commons User's Guide on the Jakarta web page. This book complements the online examples, and serves as a useful reference.

This book serves as a good introduction to commons project. It gave me a brief overview and applicability of the projects. Though the Cookbook doesn't serve as a exhaustive reference in itself, it starts the ground work .

It is a very good book, but there is some stuff that's missing and it's important, like Commons Validator

This book does provide a good overview of some of the most popular libraries in the Commons project. Although I have read and enjoyed several other Cookbook style books on more general topics, I did not find this one as useful. This is because the Jakarata Commons recipies are very speicific, and cover a wide array of unrelated topics. If you have a specific need that is covered, you will likely find the book helpful. Otherwise, it may be like some of the real cookbooks in my kitchen that are interesting, but rarely used.

The Jakarta Commons Cookbook provides an excellent resource into the many useful features and functions in the Apache Jakarta Commons libraries. In addition to the nice cookbook style, there are large numbers of examples in one single volume. This is an indispensable book for the Java developers who want to understand the Jakarta Commons libraries.