5 comments about XML, XSLT, Java, and JSP: A Case Study in Developing a Web Application.

1. Having seen the other reviews, I was curious about this book. In short, the title does say it all, as the author presents a nice case study of how HE used XML, XSLT, Java and JSP to develop a Web application. As such, there is not a lot of discussion introducing these technologies - that is not the point of a case study. Instead, the reader is introduced to how the author explored the use of these technologies to building a specific application.

   In this light, the book provides a very interesting perspective. The primary reason I have for not rating it higher is that the technology is slightly out of date (given the publication date), especially with respect to XSLT and JSP, but this is hardly surprising given how rapidly these technologies evolve. If you want to learn about these technologies, look elsewhere. If you want an insight into how one developer built a web application, however, you should check this book out, you might be surprised.




2. There are some books that are published that you wonder why the publisher went through the exercise. New Riders should have rejected this manuscript. It claims to be a case study of XML, XSLT, and JSP but it isn't. It is a confused and confusing discussion of the author playing around with technology.

   The author wanted to try out some ideas so he decided to write a chat program. But there is no real design effort (you won't find a single UML diagram anywhere) so it is difficult to understand precisely what the application is supposed to look like. Without any real design, the application ends up with one servlet of over 50 pages and another of over 40 pages in length. (The book is inflated with 300 pages of source listings that are unreadable.) As a case study in how to do bad design and write awful code, the book can serve as a warning perhaps. As far as actually trying to explain any of this technology, the author admits that isn't the purpose of the book. In a case study you like to hear of problems encountered or the different solutions attempted but you won't. No mention is made of security or performance. The code itself is useless and can't be used in other applications because it is so poorly designed. The author admits that huge chunks of code need to be refactored.

   Overall this book fails to provide any real value.




3. I've found that this book goes in a lot of depth on a host of topics. I wouldn't recommend it for someone who is just starting out, because the topcs are pretty advanced, but for those who are looking a for a depth of study, this is definitely the way go to. It covers each topic in detail, with a realtive amount of background that helps cover the topic completely.



4. This book is a case study of a project using a combination of two of the hottest technologies around for delivering interactive web applications: XSLT and JSP Tags. It is not a text book. It is hard to give it a star rating because it is not particularly well written (the author is a better programmer than writer in my opinion) however the content is unique and will be of particular interest to those wanting to use both JSP and XSLT technologies to separate web page content from application code and data.

   There are many books on JSPs but they tend to have minimal content on XSLT beyond how to set up a basic custom tag to drive an XSLT processor. Likewise there are many titles dealing with XSLT that have little detail on how to intergrate XSLT processing into a JSP based application. This book deals with how they can work together which is why I describe it as unique.

   Another big plus for this book is that the content is non-trivial and discusses a real problem, not made up easy-peazy ones designed to show off this or that feature of the XML, XSL or JSP specifications.

   The source code for the case study looks experimental becasue it is experimental. Mr Rockwell makes it quite clear that much of it is marked down for revision, as it should be in an iterative development process. It is not always easy to follow, but once you get into it you can see exactly what he's trying to do and there are some genuine nuggets in there which you won't find anywhere else.

   In summary, if you want to use both XSLT and JSP custome tags in your web applications and you are trying to figure out how to do it, you should consider investing in this.




5. Although the author patently knows his onions, it seems he hasn't a great deal of experience in conveying that information.

   In my opinion, if you just want to see an example of web app creation and get a few (great) ideas, then yes, buy the book.

   But if you want to figure out how to configure Tomcat, etc, in preparation for a new development, then look elsewhere.

   The book spends a lot of its time telling the reader that what they need to know is either out of the scope (detailed descriptions of web.xml and server.xml are out of scope?!) or that they should look on some other (somtimes unreachable) webpage.

   For example, how do you tell Tomcat where to find your compiled classes? I would first try looking in the index for setting the Tomcat CLASSPATH.

   The index has one entry for classpath and what does it tell me on page 17?

   "If you are looking for some clarity regarding which, if any, setting for the CLASSPATH environment you should use, we can think of no better place for you to find answers than ...

5 comments about Professional JSP : Using JavaServer Pages, Servlets, EJB, JNDI, JDBC, XML, XSLT, and WML.

1. Too wordy, like other WROX books.



2. I didn't like this book. The examples are hard to follow. Also, it assumes you want to use other technologies like Servlets in conjunction of your JSP pages, which I'm not. API is not organized very well and hard to find things fast. I hope my O'Reilly (on order) is better...



3. The title of my review sums it up. For a beginner I expected this book to get me up and running, It never did. I read the first 5 chapters and their was way too much focus on the Java code that was created by the JSP engine from a JSP page, and not enough emphasis on how to implement and use JSP. BOOOOH. And there are numerous spelling mistakes, including one on the first page of the introduction. C'mon WROX, wheres your QA/Copywriters? I will return this in exchange for ISBN 1884777996



4. I think the authors of this book are really "Professional" in working on their projects, but not really "Professional" on how to work together to make a good book that is easy to read and understand. I'd recommend "Web developement with Java Server Pages" (from the IBM "Einstein" & the MIT "Rocketman") Save your penny my friends.



5. The most comprehensive book I've ever read about JSP! Must have for JSP developer

No comments about XML Programming Using the Microsoft XML Parser.

2 comments about MS Excel 2002 VBA/XML Programming and ASP.

1. A very useful book for me. Her style and organization make an excellent complement to the more Microsoft-inspired style and organization of material of other experts. Her "warp" to their "woof." She's got a new one on Excel coming out in late 2005 and I'll definitely get it.



2. What a delight to be able to actually "read" a book on VBA.
   The writer is lucent and accessible and does not try to con you into the belief that VBA is a 15 hr.learning curve. Explanations are clear and the text will serve as an excellent reference source for years to come.
   Watch out Mr Spreadsheet/Mr Excel here is a writer who not only knows her subject inside out but is able to impart this knowledge in a painless fashion that others simply cannot!

3 comments about UDDI: Building Registry-based Web Services Solutions.

1. There are several resources that take a "reference book" approach when explaining a technology. While that solves the immediate problem of getting syntax right, it rarely helps in getting proper understanding about how a technology is suppose work within a solution. Such books also fail to provide an understanding of how and when to employ the specific technology while designing and implementing a solution to a specific problem. I found that this book has refreshingly taken a different approach --- looking at a technology from architect or technologist perspective. Sure, it has devoted about a third of the book to UDDI APIs, a section that will be useful for developers, but at the same time, it also provides several insights for senior technical members of a team. For example, the five usage models for business registries in corporate environment covers practically all scenarios in which a business registry-based application can be created. Some of the discussion, such as that on Web services ecosystem or on vendor-customer relationships and role of business registries in those is even useful for IT and business managers.

   Overall, I find it a complete book on UDDI -- one that caters to the needs of not only developers, but also senior technology staff in a team as well as IT and business managers for whom registry technologies are relevant.




2. This book spends a tremendous amount of pages per idea. There is a lot of code in the main text (should be on a digital medium or at least the appendix). And this code is even repeated in .Net and Java.

   Anyhow:
   It is a fast and swift read.
   You get some examples.
   You do find things you do not find in other books.

   My best recommendation for UDDI is still the corresponding chapter in Eric Newcomer's Web Services book.

   This book is part of the Hewlett-Packard Professional books series. Except for the cover design, this is (luckily) not noticeable at all. Well the company employs the authors.




3. Several books in the market gloss over the UDDI technology. It is usually an addendum to a book about Web services or service oriented architecture. It was a pleasant surprise to see that there is a book dedicated to this topic. I firmly believe that until registries such as UDDI become commonplace, the true vision of SOA cannot be achieved. The authors make several good points regarding this. I also liked the examples used in the book -- more real-world than registering hello world services.
   
   It's bit longer read, but totally worth it when you are writing and registering more complex Web services than Echo and 20-min delayed stock quote.

5 comments about XML: The Annotated Specification.

1. I am a director in the Financial Services practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers. DuCharme's book is an essential part of our syllabus for XML training. The book is a brilliant reference work and review of the XML language. It is not a tutorial on XML application development, but that is not it's purpose. A great part of its attraction, is that it is a concise, readable and generalized reference text for the XML language, on par with other well known referenes for other languages, such as Lippman's C++ Primer.



2. Despite some problems relating to clarity, I gave this book 4 stars because it fills a dire need: it provides annotation and rationale to an otherwise tedious, opaque specification. (I don't mean to single out the XML spec here; it's better than most. Specifications, by their very nature [i.e., formal] are difficult to read.)

   The book has been very useful to me, not as an introduction to XML, but as a reference.




3. This book is an example of disorganizaiton. I am learning XML, and this book have given me hard time underestanding what is it all about. for example, it talks about stuff in chapter 2 that won't be discussed until chapter 4, so you won't be able to underestand anything since all chapters of the book follow the same rythm. In addition to that, there was no comprehensive examples that will help giving more or better underestanding. Bad Bad XML book.



4. If you need to get up to speed on the XML recommendation for serious application development, this book is a very informative explanation of W3C's results. It's an excellent reference work. It provides thoughtful insights into some fairly complicated subjects. Colleagues wanted to read my first copy so much that I bought another one. It is not a tutorial, not a hands-on code walk-through, and not for the casual user. It's precisely what it says it is -- the "annotated specification".



5. This contains the XML specification with annotation by the author. Text from the specification is printed on shaded background so there is no confusing the specification and the author's annotation. One of the design goals of the XML working group was: "The design of XML shall be formal and concise." The PDF version of the specification runs to thirty-two pages. So, an annotated version of the specification is welcome. Annotation consists of illustration, clarification, background and examples. While the blurb on the back cover says that the book includes over 170 "real-world" examples, that is a stretch. The author frequently uses intuitively meaningful element and attribute names in meaningless combinations. For example, this is offered as an example of an attribute declaration with a default value (p. 111): . In a similar vein, the author provides illustrations of element content models with no apparent use. For example, . Real "real-world" examples facilitate not only our formal understanding of XML, but also its proper use. Having said all that, I should add that I do think the book worthwhile. Note that this is on the recommended reading list for IBM's XML certification test.

No comments about XML Interview Questions, Answers, and Explanations: XML Certification Review.

1 comments about XML Web Services in the Organization (Pro-Developer).

1. While most books on this subject target Web services in internet based commercial applications, this book targets the most quickly growing developer audience for XML Web services - the corporate solution developer.

   Don't be fooled however, by its slim 190 pages. There is ample content in those pages, including a comprehensive section on securing Web services.

   One feature of the book that is especially worth noting is the "extra credit" section located at the end of each chapter. These sections encourage the reader to take the concepts presented in the chapter and apply them to solve current problems in their corporation.

   I thoroughly enjoyed reading XML Web Services in the Organization and was able to immediately apply what I had learned in a real-world solution.

No comments about XML Data Exchange Using ABAP.

5 comments about XML: The Complete Reference.

1. The book XML: The Complete Reference has been of great use to me. I had taken a class on web sites and document designs, for my company, and the class used XML: The Complete Reference as a guide. I thought that Ms. Williamson did an excellant job creating a guide and reference book for XML. I use it whenever I have any questions while using XML. It has been wonderful and a great help.



2. We have been using this book as a Training manual and reference book for all of our classes in XML. It is very thorough and contains all the information anyone will need to be able to get started with XML programming. I think that MS Williamson has done a great job of putting together a lot of information in a book that can be used by people of different levels of knowledge and expertise.



3. I have found Ms. Williamson's XML reference book to be useful whenever I have any questions. It has been easy to find the answers and a great help.



4. I found XML: The Complete Reference to be a worthy book to have in my library. You will not learn everything there is to know about XML in this book, but you will be able to understand it well enough to begin. I have used this book over and over to look up little things that need. It is sometimes dificult to find what you are looking foor. But I have put tabs in my book to help me. If you program in XML, you will use this book everyday. This is a must have!



5. This book is very useful and well written. The topics covered include XML basics, DTD's, style sheets, XML schemas, XML Query, XHTML, SYMM and MIL. It describes each topic in detail and with examples. Some of the examples help understand the different error messages given by the validating parsers. Perhaps that is the part programmers are mostly interested in.

   Topics like XML Query and RDF are out of date as of now (Sept 2002), due to new W3C specifications, but introduction provided in the book is still useful for getting started. I really like XML Query chapter because no other small introduction is available elsewhere as of now.

   This book is an excellent choice to get started with XML. It has got all the basics and nice examples.