Java basics vs Java improvements / changes

[Marilyn de Queiroz]

Hi Burt & Kathy,

I'm wondering if this new book covers Java from "beginning to end" or does it concentrate more on the newer stuff? How much emphasis does the exam give to basics vs specific Java version differences ?

[Bert Bates]

Hi Marilyn!

How's it going?

The OCA 7 exam (which is covered in Part I of the book), covers the basics that have been around forever. A few little "project coin" things have been added.

The OCP exam covers some of the old basics, but it's where most of the "new" stuff is covered. Some of the big new stuff (some APIs some Java 7), is: NIO 2, new exception handling, design patterns that are new to the exam, java.util.concurrent, and JDBC.

So Oracle added all the important Java 7 additions AND they added exam objectives for a bunch of API stuff that's been around, but never tested before. All in all... it's HUGE.

[Marilyn de Queiroz]

Thanks, Bert. That's good information.