Java Generics and Collections: Speed Up the Java Development Process

by Naftalin, Philip Wadler, Maurice Naftalin

Book Overview

This comprehensive guide shows you how to master the most important changes to Java since it was first released. Generics and the greatly expanded collection libraries have tremendously increased the power of Java 5 and Java 6. But they have also confused many developers who haven't known how to take advantage of these new features.

Java Generics and Collections covers everything from the most basic uses of generics to the strangest corner...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0596527756
• ISBN13: 9780596527754
• Release Date: November 2006
• Publisher: O'Reilly Media
• Length: 284 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 7.1" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Wonderful Book on Generics and Collections With Java Focus

'Java Generics and Collections' by Maurice Naftalin in a fantastic book focussed on this interesting topic of generics and collections with Java as the main language to explore these programming concepts. At nearly 300 pages in length, this book has plenty of meat and content within. I love the new font look in this O'Reilly book and was impressed all throughout while perusing this book. 15 chapters of content are seen when you pull back the cover and start reading. This book 'could' be for the most novice of programmers but it's better suited towards a more experienced programmer that is looking to expand their knowledge and become a BETTER developer. If you want to learn about generics and collections for Java or any language, this is a great reference to learn and expand your development skillset with best practices in mind. **** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

HOW ABOUT A HOT CUP OF JAVA ?

Do you wish to process lists? If you do, then this book is for you. Authors Maurice Naftalin and Philip Wadler, have done an outstanding job of writing a book that shows you how to master the most important changes to Java since it was first released. Naftalin and Wadler, begin with an overview of generics and other new features in Java 5. Then, the authors review how subtyping works and explain how wildcards let you use subtyping in connection with generics. Next, they describe how generics works with the Comparable interface, which requires a notion of bounds on type variables. They also look at how generics work with various declarations. The authors continue by explaining how to evolve legacy code to exploit generics. Then, they explain how the same design that leads to ease of evolution also necessarily leads to a few rough edges in the treatment of casts, exceptions and arrays. Next, they explain new features that relate generics and reflection. The authors also give advice on how to use generics effectively in practical coding. They continue by looking at how generics affect well known design patterns. Then, the authors give an overview of the Framework and then look in detail at each of the main interfaces and the standard implementation of them. Finally, the authors look at the special-purpose implementation and generic algorithms provided in the Collections class. This most excellent book covers everything from the most basic uses of generics to the strangest collections cases. Perhaps more importantly, this book shows you everything you need to know about the collections libraries!

Everything you ever wanted to know about collections and generics...

This is one of the most in-depth books on the Java topics of generics and collections... Java Generics and Collections, by Maurice Naftalin and Philip Wadler. It covers the gamut from the basics to advanced... Contents: Part 1 - Generics: Introduction; Subtyping and Wildcards; Comparison and Bounds; Declarations; Evolution, Not Revolution; Reification; Reflection; Effective Generics; Design Patterns Part 2 - Collections: The Main Interfaces of the Java Collections Framework; Preliminaries; The Collection Interface; Sets; Queues; Lists; Maps; The Collections Class; Index There have been quite a few books out that deal with the new Java 5.0 features, of which generics and collections are the featured items. But few go past the basics and common usage. Naftalin and Wadler devote this entire book to just those new features, which means they can spend a lot more time diving into the guts of how they work. There are nice "before generics" and "after generics" comparisons in the one section, so you can see how current coding styles can be enhanced and modified. I also liked how some basic design patterns were used to show how generics can be incorporated into standard designs. The collections material is just as helpful. Each type of collection is covered in detail, both for the reference on how it's coded as well as diagrams to show the architecture of that type of list. Again, when you get done with the section, there shouldn't be too many questions and issues surrounding collections that you can't answer or at least figure out. Solid material, and definitely a title you'll want to have around when you start playing around with generics and collections...

A 'must' for any working Java programmer.

Java's had many changes since its initial release and programmers would find it easy to fall behind on all these new collection libraries, so Java Generics and Collections is an essential tool for any programmer working in Java lready, who would keep up with the design and nature of generics. From parameter basics and new features to using wildcards, generic libraries and understanding performance implications of their different options, Java Generics and Collections is a 'must' for any working Java programmer. Diane C. Donovan California Bookwatch

Excellent explanation of Java generics and its usage

The intent of Generics is make your Java code type-safer. While Java is a strongly typed language, it lacks type-safety when it comes to using collections. Generics were added to the Java programming language in 2004 as part of J2SE 5.0. Unlike C++ templates, generic Java code generates only one compiled version of a generic class. Generic Java classes can only use object types as type parameters -- primitive types are not allowed. Thus a List of type Integer, which uses a primitive wrapper class is legal, while a List of type int is not legal. Part I of this book provides a thorough introduction to generics. Generics are a powerful, and sometimes controversial, new feature of the Java programming language. This part of the book describes generics, using the Collections Framework as a source of examples. The first five chapters focus on the fundamentals of generics. Chapter 1 gives an overview of generics and other new features in Java 5, including boxing, foreach loops, and functions with a variable number of arguments. Chapter 2 reviews how subtyping works and explains how wildcards let you use subtyping in connection with generics. Chapter 3 describes how generics work with the Comparable interface, which requires a notion of bounds on type variables. Chapter 4 looks at how generics work with various declarations, including constructors, static members, and nested classes. Chapter 5 explains how to evolve legacy code to exploit generics, and how ease of evolution is a key advantage of the design of generics in Java. Once you have these five chapters under your belt, you will be able to use generics effectively in most basic situations. The next four chapters treat advanced topics. Chapter 6 explains how the same design that leads to ease of evolution also necessarily leads to a few rough edges in the treatment of casts, exceptions, and arrays. The fit between generics and arrays is the worst rough corner of the language, so two principles are formulated to help work around the problems. Chapter 7 explains new features that relate generics and reflection, including the newly generified type "Class T" and additions to the Java library that support reflection of generic types. Chapter 8 contains advice on how to use generics effectively in practical coding. Checked collections, security issues, specialized classes, and binary compatibility are all considered. Chapter 9 presents five extended examples, looking at how generics affect five well-known design patterns: Visitor, Interpreter, Function, Strategy, and Subject-Observer. The following is a list of chapters in part one: Chapter 1. Introduction Chapter 2. Subtyping and Wildcards Chapter 3. Comparison and Bounds Chapter 4. Declarations Chapter 5. Evolution, Not Revolution Chapter 6. Reification Chapter 7. Reflection Chapter 8. Effective Generics Chapter 9. Design Patterns Part II is about the Java Collections Framework, which is a set of interfaces and classes in the packages j