[.ca] Java Database Best Practices (ISBN 0596005229)

Should have been called "Review and Comparison of Java ...":
This book barely scratches the surface of the persistence domain. There is a review and brief comparison of different approaches but by no means an in-depth account for each. Still searching for that perfect book...

Has a rushed-to-press feel:
This book has the potential to become a "must have" book in a future edition. But the current edition has the feel of a book that was rushed to press without really being ready. Some of the best practices are not well explained or even explained at all. Occasionally, they are not worded carefully enough or even seem to contradict each other. The syntax errors (which are more common in the tutorial chapters) highlight this rushed feel. Overall, though, I think the book has useful content, and I learned some neat stuff from it. I'm hoping that another, more carefully written and reviewed edition gets published.

Good for intermediate Java guy aspiring to be senior:
This book hit the sweet spot for me: I had some knowledge of PL/SQL and database concepts already, and would classify myself as an "intermediate" Java developer. I'm almost done with this book, and it has been not only a pleasure to read, but it has really solidified my knowledge of what is important in database design. In a large workgroup setting, there's a tendency to focus on what has been mandated as the database programming API, so I found the author's overview of all major persistence approaches nice, providing some food for thought. I would say the performance tips, which often appear as boxed "Best Practices" throughout the book, are a key good feature of the book. I really like the author's style, which is clear and pragmatic. In the fashion of the famous 80/20 rule, he points out when there are differences in ways of doing things that exist, but don't make *that* much difference. My last observation will sound trivial, but to me it was another thing to like: the book is compact, a little more than half an inch thick, which makes it easy to just take with you whenever there's a bit of predictable downtime (commuting, lunch, etc).

A good source of advised best pracitce:
I have just seriously reading the chapters about EJB, JDBC, Servlet and JSP, I found that there are some tricks I have used but I have not stated the reason, this book provides some short and brief reasoning for each tips to clarify why I need to do and not to do. It is very handy to me, even I explained that to my associate consultants, I don't need a long conversation. I believe the author does not mean we need to follow the best practice but hope that developers/architect can outline a set of standard/practice for the development. It is the main reason for us to read. If you have your own standard, programmer A has his/her own style, then it is hard to trace and maintain the system.

A good choice:
I really like reading this book. This book discusses a lot of database concepts. The author talks about how to use the javax.sql libraries. I found the book easy to read. I found the snippets of code useful. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn advanced concepts on databases with JAVA. Michael