<pre>
Author/s : Mahmoud Parsian
Publisher : Apress
Category : Data modeling, SQL and JDBC
Review by : Jeanne Boyarsky
Rating : 6 horseshoes</pre>
The 600 page "JDBC Recipes" might make a decent 100 page book. Some problem/solutions are repeated verbatim and others are repeated with minimal changes. For example, there are at least 8 distinct sections on closing a database resource. The BLOB/CLOB and Statement/PreparedStatement chapters are at least 50% identical.
Despite all this repetition, coverage manages to be spotty on other topics. For example, CallableStatements are barely mentioned. Many ways are presented of doing a task, but the tradeoffs aren't covered. Except for connection pooling, there weren't many comments about
JDBC in practice.
The stated audience is developers knowing the basics of
Java, JDBC and databases. Examples span 1-4 pages of code with only minimal, high-level comments afterwards. Experienced developers know most of this stuff and shouldn't have to plow thru so much code to discern the important points.
The examples are tailored to Oracle and mySql. If you want to write code without vendor lock-in, this book doesn't help. The cover says "Java EE 5 compliant." While true, this is misleading. Most references are to the 1.4 JavaDoc. The 5.0 references don't use the new features.
The book serves a very narrow audience. If you want to copy/paste Oracle/mySql code verbatim, the book's website is very useful. If you have a database framework, want cross-database compatibility, best practices or are simply reading for understanding, I recommend a different book.
More info at Amazon.com More info at Amazon.co.uk