Wanna learn Java? Well here's how.

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Clyde

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Okay, I don't want MC-Market to become the next spigot where people who ask questions like "I wanna learn java!", or similar everyday, so here's a little thread to help you guys out in beginning your java adventures.

Let's begin:
Java isn't an easy language to master, nor is it the #1 choice to go for your first programming language (I'd recommend Python as a first), but it is an amazing language to learn and become aware of as it can do so much, but I'm sure most of you who are reading this are only here because you wanna make bukkit/spigot plugins, but keep in mind that you'll have to learn AT LEAST 3 months of Java just to make basic plugins (Depending how fast you can learn, how much you can remember, etc.). Anyways, let me give you my recommendations on what you could use to start (or expand) your Java adventures:

Ammar T offers good and educational tutorials for a cheap price, so if you work best taught, he's your go-to guy.

Mat is a really knowledgeable Java Developer, I've also heard great things about him from others, though I am not sure whether he teaches anymore, I'm sure he'll be willing to for a fixed price.

1.DerekBanas (8.5/10) - https://youtube.com/user/derekbanas
Derek offers really good tutorials, though he sometimes doesnt explain things very well, a quick Google search would do you well so you can understand what he means.

2. CaveOfProgramming (9/10) - https://youtube.com/user/caveofprogramming
John Purcell offers splendid tutorials and goes into really good detail about what everything means (In my opinion). He's easy to grow your knowledge upon and will do amazing as a starting instructor.

3. TheNewBoston (6.5/10) - https://youtube.com/user/thenewboston
Personally I would never recommend to learn off him unless you wish to learn some fairly bad practice, but he is really good for beginners to get somewhat of an idea on learning Java (I would recommend going to a new instructor once you get an idea of how Java works).

Java for Dummies
Head First Java (2nd Edition)
Thinking in Java (4th Edition)
Oracle's Java Documentation - https://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/

These 3 books in my opinion are really good and would benefit those who love to read and learn really well from reading plenty!

CodeAcademy (Bad practice, lack of detail in teaching + you will learn very little about Java there)
-More coming soon-

That's about it for this little thread! If you have any suggestions let me know!

Mat - He's an awesome developer, though I personally never spoken to him, he knows what he's doing and does help the community a lot with his tips.

Savvy - I've persoanlly known him for quite some time now, he's a really cool guy to be friends with and has helped me plenty of times with my issues in Java.

Justis - He's a really cool guy to know and talk to. Though I mostly bugged him with Text-to-speech on discord for the lols, he does help me a ton with my Java issues as well.

Blasthappy - Though I don't personally lnow him much, he has helped me with questions I've had, even when I can possibly be a bit annoying to him. Though he's still fairly new to java compared to the others, he is pretty good and can defenitely get a job done.
 
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Ammar T

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Thanks for the mention :).
 
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Java Documentation is a great place to learn as well, don't have to rely on someone being online or that next youtube video being published.
 
Clyde

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slooth said:
Java Documentation is a great place to learn as well, don't have to rely on someone being online or that next youtube video being published.
Click to expand...
Will it add it now![DOUBLEPOST=1485451901][/DOUBLEPOST]drtshock, may I ask why for the disagree? I may remove one of my recommendations, or fix something if needed.
 
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Justis

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I don't exactly agree with your time frame. You can make a basic bukkit plugin within a day of a little research. It does, however, take a good few months of java knowledge to make anything decent; not just in abilities but in how it's written.

Head first java was a great help to me back when I was learning about polymorphism for the first time, but other than that, I didn't really like the book. It focused more on concepts than real juicy details and options you can and should use in real world development. So when reading it, I did feel like there was a lot I wasn't getting out of it, like they never took that full plunge. (Despite the name, head first).

A decent book to get started on, but I would definitely recomend filling in the many holes it leaves using other sources. (As you should always do, no matter what you start with)

Effective Java is definitely my favorite java book so far. It gives tons of examples on the best and the worst ways to do things (because yes, there are a million ways to do things in java, but that doesn't mean you should use them all in your project).
It's a reliable source for teaching yourself development patterns and proper coding conventions above all else, and trust me, when you're using good habits, developing itself will become infinitely easier, especially for larger projects.
Some of the words and concepts it uses in it's explanations might be a little advanced for those just getting into java, but nevertheless I consider it a must-read.
 
Clyde

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Justis R said:
I don't exactly agree with your time frame. You can make a basic bukkit plugin within a day of a little research. It does, however, take a good few months of java knowledge to make anything decent; not just in abilities but in how it's written.

Head first java was a great help to me back when I was learning about polymorphism for the first time, but other than that, I didn't really like the book. It focused more on concepts than real juicy details and options you can and should use in real world development. So when reading it, I did feel like there was a lot I wasn't getting out of it, like they never took that full plunge. (Despite the name, head first).

A decent book to get started on, but I would definitely recomend filling in the many holes it leaves using other sources. (As you should always do, no matter what you start with)

Effective Java is definitely my favorite java book so far. It gives tons of examples on the best and the worst ways to do things (because yes, there are a million ways to do things in java, but that doesn't mean you should use them all in your project).
It's a reliable source for teaching yourself development patterns and proper coding conventions above all else, and trust me, when you're using good habits, developing itself will become infinitely easier, especially for larger projects.
Some of the words and concepts it uses in it's explanations might be a little advanced for those just getting into java, but nevertheless I consider it a must-read.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the suggestion! I will look into your recommended book and add it soon. I was basing this thread off how my experience learning Java was and how i learnt it as it may help a ton others for getting into Java. The books i recommended were some that I found fairly useful to me in my studies, but I agree, some of the books arent the best for a targetted study (If you wanna just learn the core concepts). Also, I said 3 months as a time frame to make plugins that actually serve a purpose, not just something that sends a message and you're done (Like chat modification plugins, etc.).
 
drtshock

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Lilith said:
Will it add it now![DOUBLEPOST=1485451901][/DOUBLEPOST]drtshock, may I ask why for the disagree? I may remove one of my recommendations, or fix something if needed.
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https://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/ should be listed first imo. If you hope to be a good programmer, you should be able to learn by reading docs

If you just want to code a super basic plugin and then go back to your day job, it doesn't really matter.
 
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