I don't pretend to be a programming guru, but sometimes I describe myself as a 'net geezer, because I've been creating one sort or another of web content since 1994 (you do the math).

As programmers go, I'm just a working stiff, like the guy or gal in the next cube. In fact, I may even be the guy in the next cube. Whatever. I've been developing web applications in Java since 1999. I've taken some junior college courses, had some of those week-long training sessions. I'm certified. I do the work. I get the job done, and I like to think I do it well.

Basically, these are the books I'd loan you if you stopped by my cube and asked me what you should read to find out more about Java.

Like you (and/or the guy or gal in the next cube), my primary reference works for getting the job done are the standard Sun-authored, JavaDoc-generated, HTML APIs for the SDK and J2EE programming packages. I've downloaded them to my desktop for speedy access, added their local address bookmarks to my Opera "personal" toolbar and set the SDK's API as my homepage. And I refer to them frequently ... at least weekly, some weeks daily.

I think that's fairly typical behavior for a programmer. If it isn't. If you're a truly manly or womanly programmer who Don't Need No Stinkin' Reference, please keep this to yourself. You'll only discourage the rest of us by sharing.

Be that as it may, sometimes this programmer wants something that goes beyond what the basic APIs have to offer.

Sometimes that something more is just a more congenially integrated picture of what the core Java library or one of its packages has to offer, something that will help me pick the right class or classes for the task at hand -- usually, but not always, after the task at hand has been determined. I think of the books that provide that more integrated picture as tactical resources.

Other times I want a bigger picture. I'm not trying to figure out how to accomplish the task at hand, because I don't know what that is yet, exactly. I'm trying to figure out what tasks are to be done and how best to accomplish them in the furtherance of my client's objectives. I consider the books that show me that bigger picture to be strategic resources.

The books described in these pages are all books that have actually been purchased by the reviewer, books the reviewer continues to keep around, quite literally. At the very least, these are books that reside on shelves in our offices (in my case, just the other side of the small rack that holds my small television and boom box). In some cases, these are books that travel with us and rest uneasily in the overhead compartment in our cubicles while we work on-site for our clients.

In either case, the books reviewed in these pages have demonstrated a utilitarian value. In neither case have these books been provided to me as review copies by their publishers. They're here because we've found them to be useful, not because someone has asked us to pitch them to you. (I'm speaking strictly of the books reviewed here, not the books shown in the Amazon.Com advertisements on these pages. These selections are generated dyamically on the Amazon site from a keyword search. Some of those have looked pretty good to me and the prices have been pretty good, frequently with dicounts of up to 30% when you follow the links. But they change every day, so unless a book accidentally shows up there that is coincidentally reviewed in these pages, please don't consider them our recommendations.)

A word on the descriptions:
One way to know what a publisher intended for a book to be is to know its tagline(s): those snappy little phrases on the cover (and sometimes even on the title page) that aren't the title. I happen to be a sucker for these. They often are what lead me to buy one book over another while squatting on the floor at our friendly neighborhood Barnes & Noble or Borders. That's why I've included those lines here, for those books that have them.

Beyond what you could discover for yourself with your own personal physical inspection of these books, you will also find here brief descriptions of the general uses to which I put these volumes and occasional anecdotal sketches of the most recent circumstances that sent me scrambling to this or that tome. I'm hoping that might help you determine what the book actually turned out to be.

1. Tactical Resources
2. Strategic Resources
3. Ed's Recommendation