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The JFC Swing Tutorial: A Guide to Constructing GUIs (2nd Edition) Review by Patrick Thompson
More of a reference than a tutorial
3.5 stars
Having used the book a number of times I find it an excellent first reference for doing most relatively simple to intermediate things with swing. It has excellent organization and index so finding what you need is quite easier and fast. There are many code samples- snippets, not full listings- showing how are use the major and most heavily used features of most components. It is also written in an approachable and helpful manner. It disavows exhaustive coverage of every single feature ( Try Swing by Robinson and Vorobiev- ISBN 193011088X for that)
This book is not a tutorial on java. There is no overview of the language. There is a disc with code listing. The style is generally of a bunch of small, self contained lessons on how to use a component- hence the usefulness as a first reference (at the cost of cohesiveness and an overriding arch). Where it falls down is when you progress beyond beginner-intermediate level with swing and want major coverage of obscure features. This probably isn't a problem for most of us not needing to attain guru level swing-skill. I think a solid example on how to use the MVC pattern (Model View Controller where Swing addresses the View) would have been a nice (and appreciated!) addition. From personal experience there is a tendency to put too much Model in the View rather than separate them out so changes/updating through versions is simpler. Learning this lesson is a must for anybody working with GUI's.
At times too there is the annoyance of not including things you would consider necessary, for example an explicit example of a combo box model and so forth. This devalues the work to some extent. A brief reminder of annoymous inner classes (as event handlers of choice) should also be included as too perhaps some mention of threads and thread safety. Thus the book requires a certain level and certain approach. Just remember it isn't a step-by-step, "let's build an application" tutorial through Swing.
So overall: a good book to start with and keep handy as more of a easy reference than a tutorial (I like paper references rather than online ones so I maybe baised in this respect). It's light on some areas, particuarly higher level and greater depth stuff. It starts at a reasonable level if you have some experience with Java (a typical book like Core Java by Horstmann covers easily up to and enough Swing to get you to the point where this book is a reference rather than a how-to). As a how-to for a novice I think it may be beyond many of them. Swing: A Beginner's Guide by Herbert Schildt may be better in this regard. If you don't mind the short, sharp discrete (disjointed) approach to concepts than you might not mind this. Otherwise it may be frustrating.