Learn some language in some time scale

piersk

Thinking about buying Learn Java in 24 hrs...

What do people think about these sort of books? Any good?

Mordecai

Don't learn a language in 24 hours. If you can do that, you're the world's best learner--or the book only teaches you the basics. Most likely, these books do the latter.
I would advise against books that attempt to teach you languages in an obviously impossible time period (i.e. 24 hours). I have read Teach Yourself C++ in 21 Days (SAMS Publishing), and it was actually rather thorough. But you must compare 21 days to 24 hours... very different.

vaaaska

I would like to learn Finnish in 5 minutes. Oh, and Latvian too.

bubblenut

Well, I'd recoment O'Reilly's Learning Java for a book but, IMHO, even more usefull was the forum at java.sun.com. It's nowhere near as friendly as this place (as I think has been mentioned in a thread here before) but they they can be very helpfull and the very rarely get any flaming action (not unless you ask really dumb questions like yours truely:p)

LordShryku

The 24 hours in those books are literal. 24 actual hours, and the books usually suggest you spread it out as one chapter per day. One of the first Java books I bought was Java 2 in 24 hours, and it's good for a beginner coming in knowing no java. It gives you the basics, and starts in on some more advanced topics.

piersk

Originally posted by LordShryku
One of the first Java books I bought was Java 2 in 24 hours

Thats the one I was looking at.

However, having chatted to one of my housemates and bubblenut, (and having seen a copy of the book) I'm probably gonna go for this one.

rgermain

I have used the 24 hour books before, but that was when I was first learning HTML 8 years ago and I just used it as a stepping stone. They can be useful just not the most detailed!

Also, I had a semester in Java, did not like that language at all.

Just my opinion.

Mordecai

Originally posted by rgermain
...[W]hen I was first learning HTML 8 years ago...

Heh.. I read this as, "when I was first learning HTML 8..."

BuzzLY

Aren't they on 10 now? That's why they call it XHTML, right? Right? :glare: