Re: my dream + some book recommendations

From: rfractal30 (mikesgo_at_yahoo.com)
Date: 02/21/05 

Date: 21 Feb 2005 09:54:35 -0800

I just want to thank everyone who replied - some of the suggestions
certainly have given me food for thought. The language REXX in
particularly look interesting - would of been a nice one for me to
learn when I was starting out - but I feel would be a backwards step
for me now.

I've sort of come to grips with the fact that Java is a highly complex
language - but I still feel that there are some aspects of the language
that put up unnecessary barrier to the beginner programmer. One that
stands out especially is the lack of input and output functions for the
console - this can be frustrating for the beginner programmer (I had to
hack together my own input and output classes - admittedly it was quite
an enlightening process..) As well as the lack of console classes - it
is also _way_ to complicated to create GUI's. All this stuff of frames
and JFrames, Panels, Listeners, MouseListeners, threads - you get what
I'm saying! It just makes me feel frustrated and stupid.

One thing I neglected to mention in my post is that I am limited in my
computing power. I only have 98 mb of RAM and 200 mhz process - also
I'm on dial-up. I also only have an old version of Borland's JBuilder2
(this doesn't even cover the Graphics2D). So perhaps I should not be
too hard on myself. I'm definitely not going to give up - even if it
takes me 30 years, eventually I will get to grips with Java!

Another thing - I got this book called 'Java 2 - Weekend Crash Course'
by Julio Sanchez and Maria P. Canton. I fairly recommend this book as
it is not just a book on Java - but also a book on learning how to
program for the beginner. It covers some of the fundamentals of
programming (admittedly in not too much detail). The first half of the
book does not even cover the 'object' side of Java. When it does get to
the Object Oriented approach it is quite good. It also has some nice
stuff on I/O operations and classes. Another book I can recommend
(although I have barely skimmed it) is 'Thinking in Java' by Bruce
Eckel. This seems to be very clearly written and informative. It
probably teaches more than anyone in their right mind needs to know
about class structure, interfaces and such stuff. I've got a feeling
that this book is going to be very important for my knowledge of Object
Oriented programming. Ok I'll stop now before I start to sound like a
sales rep ;-)

Thanks again - Michael

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