Some of the topics that the book covers include the following:
- Java data types
- Decision constructs
- Classes
- Handling exceptions
- Arrays and collections
Excellent explanations are provided on the topics the book covers. Especially on memory management which is a key area to understand about the Java language. Most other books don't provide the same level of explanation on this topic as this book does. Plenty of good advise is provided on handling exceptions in a Java application. All key Java 7 features are covered in reasonably good detail.
What is highly unusual about this book is that it aims to be more than just a certification guide by also acting as a general reference. Unfortunately that aim is not reached since some language basics are not covered, which include using Generics and the other key collection classes (HashMap, HashSet etc).
Highly recommend this book if you are going for the certification since it provides good coverage of the topics that are covered, and a decent number of questions for each topic that test what is learned. However this book falls a bit short on covering all the Java language basics that one would expect from a general reference.
