PREFACE
This tutorial is intended to introduce the features of the Java language. A
basic knowledge of object oriented programming (C++ or Smalltalk) is assumed.
This tutorial was influenced by Andy Painter and A. J. Turner's online
Visual Works tutorial.
Tutorial Organization and Use
The tutorial is designed to be used while simultaneously creating and
executing the Java programs.
It is assumed that Java is installed on the user's system in the standard way.
Information on obtaining and installing Java can be found at Sun's JDK page.
PURPOSE
The purpose of this tutorial is to provide an overview of the Java language and
the facilities that are provided by the standard Java class libraries, including
the Java Application Programmer Interface (API) class libraries. The
tutorial is not intended to completely cover the Java language and facilities,
but rather to provide enough understanding of the basic concepts to allow a
programmer to more easily look up additional and more specific information as
needed.
CONVENTIONS USED IN THIS TUTORIAL
Some format conventions used in the tutorial are:
- Text in bold print is used to denote language constructs.
- Text in bold italicized print is used to refer to specific lines
of code from the examples.
- Text in {braces} denotes variable information such as a specific argument for
a function invocation.
The icons at the top and bottom of each Section (that is, each segment of the
tutorial that is identified by a separate title in the
Table of Contents) are provided to facilitate moving about in the tutorial.
The tutorial is organized as a collection of Sections, some of which are
grouped into Chapters, each of which can be
accessed directly from the Table of Contents (which is also a Section).
Clicking on one of the icons takes you to another Section as follows:
- The icon
will take you to the previous Section of the tutorial.
- The icon
will take you to the next Section of the tutorial.
- The icon
will take you back to the Table of Contents.
- The icon
icon will take you
to the first Section of the previous Chapter of the tutorial.
- The icon will take you to
the first Section of the next Chapter of the tutorial.