Need your quick response and great assistance

Hello to codegurus!!


Seriously, I need your help and suggestion in order to step into Java world. I started my career back in 2005 as java member but I was never into it ever. Being a graduate form non-IT background, without any prior knowledge in C or any similar programming language I first experienced Java at the onset of my career. As a junior member in new java world, I never got chance to learn java from basic rather I started to work on already build-up architecture and codes. I did develop unit cases myself but all those were mere imitation of what there were initially. And hence, though I did work on Java and even got enough appreciations for my task, I prevailed far away from basic structures and intricacies of Java.

Now I am out of my project and want to learn Java to ensure that I reshape my past experiences and do learn the technology on which I have at least 3 years of experience. Therefore, I am seeking for your help to start my learning. More importantly, I have to change my job – it has already been 5 years since I have joined my first company -- and thus I need to learn technology very fast.



What I feel I know:

- Basic component of Java such as Data-Access-Object class, bean class, Value-Object class. I do not understand interface and abstract classes, relation between classes.

- How to open connection, close connection and access record.

- Basic operators and conditional blocks

- JSP, JSP JSF and HTML + CSS

- RAD 6.0 as Worked on it

- Struts and JSF framework along with their folder structures (no more idea about them except that both are 3-tier MVC architecture)



I have lot of questions so please bear with me and feel free to contribute your expertise.

1. Shall I start with Java Certification because that will provide me basic to advance level of learning?

2. Which software I need to have to practice Java. I have also decided to install Oracle in my system so that I can create my own end-to-end application and complete frameworks.

3. What is the average amount of time required to cover up basic and core Java. (I am an average student and I can devote 2 hrs/ day -- basically I want to add it on my daily schedule)

4. I planned for 3-4 months of continuous study. Which chapters I should start with?

5. Do I need to look for any tuition or institute or I can do it myself?

5. Kindly advice me good books for java. I do not have any book except "Kathy Sierra" for SCJP.

6. Generally, people look for theoretical knowledge in job interview. How does hands-on job contribute in that?

Sun's Java tutorials are pretty good, and for a book, Bruce Eckel's 'Thinking In Java' is also pretty good. For reference, O'Reilly's 'Java In A Nutshell' was always good, but they don't seem to have a an updated version for Java 6... still worth a look though.

Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes...
E. Dijkstra

There's a book called Head First Java which is how I learned Java. It teaches Java in a funny and easy to learn manner.