Srping book - which one is a good one ?

HI guys...I'm new for Spring framework and would like to buy a good book to start learning it. can you please help me to choose it ?

are these ones considered good books ? (I don't want a basic book, I wanna buy some that covers the most important features of it)

1) Expert Spring MVC and Web Flow:
http://www.amazon.com/Expert-Spring-MVC-Web-Flow/dp/159059584X/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257728449&sr=1-8

2) Beginning Spring Framework 2 (Paperback)
http://www.amazon.com/Beginning-Spring-Framework-Thomas-Velde/dp/047010161X/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257728449&sr=1-12

and what about these ones ?

3) Spring in Action:
http://www.amazon.com/Spring-Action-Craig-Walls/dp/1933988134/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257728449&sr=1-6

or

4) Professional Java Development with the Spring Framework (ins't it an old version of spring framework ?)
http://www.amazon.com/Professional-Java-Development-Spring-Framework/dp/0764574833/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257728449&sr=1-1

5) Spring recipes:
http://www.amazon.com/Spring-Recipes-Problem-Solut...s=books&qid=1257729242&sr=1-17

So..1, 2 , 3 , 4 or 5?

Tks so much in advance!!!

Spring in Action. Even though the book uses Spring 2.0, it's a very good book.

Spring Recipes also seems to be good. It has got some good reviews in Amazon.

Hi

I have just gone through Spring 2.5 Recepies. It seems to be a good one and takes a problem/solution approach which seems very good and simple to understand.

BR
Rahul

have read Spring in Action.. its very good. I didn't like the MVC part. The example web-app code was either incomplete or I could not understand as skipped a couple of earlier chapters

HI guys, firstly Tks so much for replying back!!

It seems that "Spring in Action" is such a good book and that "Spring recipes" could also help.

I'm wondering if this one : "Expert Spring MVC and Web Flow (Paperback)" wouldn't be such a good one too : (according to the customer's review it's not) would be a good one - so just asking whether someone has owns it or not.

http://www.amazon.com/Expert-Spring-MVC-Web-Flow/dp/159059584X/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257728449&sr=1-8

Colley!

Expert Spring MVC and Web Flow is a very good book. Don't believe customer review too much.

Expert Spring MVC and Web Flow is a recommended book from Spring Reference Documentation.

Expert Spring MVC and Web Flow was an OK book - most books at the time it was published were general books on Spring IOC and coverage of MVC was scanty. However, the book was written using an early version of Spring 2.0 (I think...) and an early beta of Web Flow - when I was reading it Spring 2.5 was just coming out - and there were differences even at that time. I don't think the book deserves the low ratings it has on Amazon - a lot of these are probably people trying the code in the book in a newer version of Spring - but releasing a new edition of the book would definitely be better. With Spring 2.5 being "standard" and Spring 3.0 upcoming, at this time, you'd probably be better served working through the online tutorial, though.

Nathan, I'm using Spring 2.5 and Spring Web MVC's contents from Expert Spring MVC and Web Flow work fine for me.

It's a very good technical book to me. Explains very clear and in depth. I don't notice much of the difference between this book and Spring 2.5 except that it doesn't mention Spring form tag which probably doesn't exist at the time the book is being written.
However, the part about Spring Web Flow is based on version 1.0 which is quite difference from 2.0, so it's not an updated resource for studying Spring Web Flow.

Anyway the Expert Spring MVC and Web Flow doesn't cover new features in Spring 2.5 like Annotation-based controllers. So it's not a best choice if you want to study features of Spring 2.5.