Introduction
What??™s Inside
This book covers all aspects of the Java programming language. Part 1 presents an in-depth tutorial of the Java language. It begins with the basics, including such things as data types, control statements, and classes. Part 1 also discusses Java??™s exception-handling mechanism, multithreading subsystem, packages, and interfaces. Part 2 examines the standard Java library. As you will learn, much of Java??™s power is found in its library. Topics include strings, I/O, networking, the standard utilities, the Collections Framework, applets, GUI-based controls, and imaging. Part 3 looks at some issues relating to the Java development environment, including an overview of Java Beans, Servlets, and Swing. Part 4 presents a number of high-powered Java applets that serve as extended examples of the way Java can be applied. The final applet, called Scrabblet, is a complete, multiuser networked game. It shows how to handle some of the toughest issues involved in Web-based programming.

What??™s New in the Fifth Edition
The differences between this and the previous editions of this book mostly involve those features added by Java 2, version 1.4. Of the many new features found in version 1.4, perhaps the most important are the assert keyword, the channel-based I/O subsystem, chained exceptions, and networking enhancements. This fifth edition has been fully updated to reflect those and other additions. New features are clearly noted in the text, as are features added by previous releases. This fifth edition also updates and restores the Sevlets chapter. Previously this chapter relied upon the now out-dated JSDK (Java Servlets Developers Kit) to develop and test servlets. It now uses Apache Tomcat, which is the currently recommended tool.