Head First Design Patterns

Hi Kathy / Bert,

In your book do you cover OO Principles like,
Liskov Substitution Principle,
Dependency Inversion Principle,
Interface Seggregation Principle etc.,

Is it possible to get the TOC .

Hi,

Is it possible to get TOC for HF Design Patterns also ?

In addition, I wanna ask when will the book come out, and will there any code examples, like SUN's blueprint book, that cover how to implement with certain patterns?

Nick

I checked B&N, it says the book is coming out tomorrow. 22 Oct '04.

That is tomorrow?

However, the promotion comes on next year.

I wish there are some more codes that discuss how to implement and incorporate patterns with Java, especially some special patterns.

Nick

We've pinged Eric and Elizabeth about your questions

They should be along shortly to respond, but I do want to confirm that the HF Patterns book should be available sometime in the next 2-7 days! As we do this book stuff more, we learn more about it, and one thing we've learned is that getting the book from the printer to Amazon and bookstores is an inexact science at best... so short term predictions have to be taken with a large grain of salt! But what I can say for sure is that the book was completed several weeks ago and it's been at the printers for a while now

Hello all,

Lots of good questions about Head First Design Patterns! First, it will likely be in stores and available online the first week of November. There's a chance it will happen before, but you never know

The TOC is as follows:

Chapter 1: Intro to Design Patterns and the Strategy Pattern
Chapter 2: Observer Pattern
Chapter 3: Decorator Pattern
Chapter 4: Factory - including Factory Method Pattern and Abstract Factory Pattern
Chapter 5: Singleton Pattern
Chapter 6: Command Pattern
Chapter 7: Adapter and Facade Patterns
Chapter 8: Template Method Pattern
Chapter 9: Iterator and Composite Patterns
Chapter 10: State Pattern
Chapter 11: Proxy Pattern
Chapter 12: Combining Patterns - including MVC.
Chapter 13: Better Living Through Patterns - which includes information on how to read a "pattern catalog".
Appendix: very SHORT summaries of the rest of the GOF patterns not covered in the main text. These are less frequently used patterns, but we hope the appendix treatment gives you enough of an idea of what they are that you can look them up in a patterns catalog if you need to use them.

We do cover many principles, including:
* Encapsulate change
* Program to an interface, not an implementation
* Favor Composition over Inheritance
* Strive for Loosely Coupled designs between objects that interact
* Open Closed Principle
* Dependency Inversion Principle
* Principle of Least Knowledge
* Hollywood Principle: Don't call us, we'll call you
* One Class / One Responsibility

There are LOADS of code examples, at least one per chapter and sometimes many.

I hope this answers your questions - feel free to post more and I'll respond!

Thank you,

Elisabeth
[ October 21, 2004: Message edited by: Elisabeth Freeman ]

Thanks Bert.

I guess I need to wait for 1-2 months, even though the book is released within a week, due to the transportation.

Nick

Elisabeth,

What is the style of the code example?

Would they be focus on a particular pattern, especially discuss about style for coding such pattern?

Also, from the table of content, I found the flow is quite similar to the book Design Patterns.

Moreover, would those patterns that covered in SCWCD in this book using Web application examples?

Anyway, I am looking forward to read this book.

Does this book cover all patterns that were discussed in Core J2EE Patterns book along with code examples ?

Hey Rajan -

This book covers the 23 GoF patterns - not J2EE patterns...

Maybe we'll tackle the J2EE patterns soon

- Bert

This book covers the 23 GoF patterns - not J2EE patterns...

That's why the TOC is quite to the book Design Patterns.

Nick

Would they be focus on a particular pattern, especially discuss about style for coding such pattern?

Also, from the table of content, I found the flow is quite similar to the book Design Patterns.

Moreover, would those patterns that covered in SCWCD in this book using Web application examples?

We tried to keep the code examples very simple, while illustrating each pattern. We definitely do discuss the pros, cons and tradeoffs of various implementations of patterns. Since we focussed on the 23 GOF paterns, there isn't coverage of the web application patterns covered in SCWCD (although we do discuss MVC and Model 2), however, like Bert said, we're considering a J2EE patterns book at some point.

Elisabeth

Thus, only MVC model has been discussed. Will there be any evaluation chapter available now?

Nick

Hey guys:

Its time Head First authors think open source in order to give this technology additional push.

Elisabeth:
Have the pdf on the web for easy access and evaluation?

Hi Anselm,

I think that five years ago tech book writers probably made a lot of money, but as I recently posted, sales of Java books are down about 80% from five years ago. That's a pretty big drop!

I'm not opposed to open source, but given that each HF title takes many months to create, how do you propose the authors get compensated? This is really a sincere question!

Thanks,

Bert

Originally posted by Anselm Paulinus:
Its time Head First authors think open source in order to give this technology additional push.

We're already starving as it is

But we do try to help people as much as possible, and we'll put articles from the book and probably a few sample chapter pieces up on the web very soon.

Many people do not realize that even a best-selling computer book today is a VERY difficult way to pay the rent. As Bert said, computer books sell only a small fraction of what they did during the bubble, and we did not get into this until *after* the big drop. We have to take other contract projects to stay alive just so that we can continue to do the books, which we dearly love working on. The feedback that we get tells us that we *are* helping at least some people learn in an easier way, and that is why we will keep doing it

But we still have to eat...

cheers,
Kathy

We understand that, Kathy and Bert.

Nowadays, life is much more difficult, especially when we worked in IT field.

Let's work hard together.

Nick

Elisabeth:
Have the pdf on the web for easy access and evaluation?

We can't put the PDF on the web; see Kathy and Bert's responses regarding "open source" of Head First. However, the book will be out and available for evaluation VERY soon and we look forward to your feedback.

I'm interested to hear more ideas from javaranchers on the open source idea.

Elisabeth

Is Indian print of this book is available?

Thanks..

Howdy -- well, with the servlets book, it seems like the Indian edition was out almost at the same time as the US version, so... I expect that the Indian version will be out very soon. The book is now in the same status the servlets book was a few weeks ago; it is sitting in trucks and warehouses waiting to be shipped from Amazon and make its way into bookstore shelves here.

I would estimate that it will be shipping to customers in the US in the next week or so, and the Indian edition will probably be out in the next 3-4 weeks, or sooner.

cheers,
Kathy

Any plans for an Architecture book?

I love Head First Servlets and JSP.

Did you ever read the Little Lisper? Like your books -- funny and helped re-inforce material through repetition without being boring.

Did you ever read the Little Lisper? Like your books -- funny and helped re-inforce material through repetition without being boring.

Yes, we have read the Little Lisper, the Little Schemer, the Seasoned Schemer - definitely a source of inspiration for us. In fact, in Chapter 5 of Head First Design Patterns, you will find a couple of pages that will look familiar

Elisabeth

HFDP is shipping from Amazon.com and B&N (among others).

Is the book oriented to swing (like an older one) or it uses console or web examples?