Sharpen PDFs posted

[Kathy Sierra]

Howdy all... just wanted you to know (whether you have the book or not) that we've posted both the Sharpen your Pencil PDFs and a jar of code to our site at:
Head First EJB page
The PDFs are the same as the ones posted to our FTP site, so there's nothing new there. The code is for the AdviceBean and the CustomerBean, so it might save you some typing... (although I still suggest that you write these yourself!! You'll learn more if you go through the process of putting in the code, exceptions, etc.).
If you have trouble compiling your own files, though, then you can test your compilation with these files, because they DEFINITELY compile.
The only other thing we have up there is two notes for the now-famous "Bad CORBA problem" and a note on the four environment variables you need for the J2EE 1.3.1 R.I.
Please let us know if you find errors! These are still a work in progress... and haven't been through any formal review process. Some of you have already found things that we're in the process of updating.
Also, we are going to be posting some more mock exam questions up there (as well as on the O'Reilly site... but they'll be the same questions on both sites.) I'll post a note here when they are up. Have fun
Cheers,
Kathy

[Philippe Maquet]

Hi Kathy,
Yesterday I posted 2 errata entries (related to mock questions) on the O'Reilly web site. I expected to find them in the "Unconfirmed error reports and comments from readers" section but they are not there yet. Do you know which is their update frequency ?
To get a quick confirmation, it's possibly more efficient to post them here to you directly.
-----------
p. 432 (entity bean relationships) - question 4 :
As the relationship is said unidirectional, answer B (b2.getFoo()) cannot be checked IMO because there is no getFoo() in Bar.
-----------
p. 434 (same chapter) - question 12 :
Which will return all orders that have line items ?
Answer D is incorrect IMO :
D. SELECT OBJECT(o) FROM Order o
because the WHERE clause is missing. To be correct, the query should be :
D. SELECT OBJECT(o) FROM Order o
WHERE o.lineItems IS NOT EMPTY
-----------
Best,
Phil.

[Bharat Ruparel]

Hello Phil,
Good to see you posting here in SCBCD forum. I am studying for this test too and am going through the HeadFirst EJB text.
Regards.
Bharat

[Philippe Maquet]

Hi Bharat, (the good one)
Great ! Good to see you here too.
I use Head First EJB too and it's really great. Unfortunately, I made a mistake in the way I used this book. When I start studying any new stuff with a book, I like to make a first quick reading to have some global view on the subject. Then I come back for a second (or even third) reading where I actually study and make summaries. With this book, I should have start studying and summarizing *immediately*, from the first reading ! Because when I tried to read it a second time, I found hard to retrieve all the important things to remember, among the text itself, the small stories, dialogs, jokes, etc, in such a way that I finally stopped my second reading at chapter 7.
I don't criticize the book, it's actually a great and useful idea of Kathy and Bert to make a hard stuff enjoyable to study and easy to understand as they did : it's just that I used it the wrong way.
So I now use the specs, a good highligther , and Valentin's cheat sheets which are so useful too.
BTW, when do you intent to attend the exam ?
Best,
Phil.

[Bharat Ruparel]

Hello Phil,
I am planning on taking the exam in about 3 to 4 weeks timeframe. How about you? By the way, I am also using Soft-learn systems exam simulator. Pretty useful and interesting stuff.
http://www.softlearn-systems.com/index.html
Regards.
Bharat
p.s We should get our buddies from SCJD to join us here. I think Andrew has already taken this exam. Vlad, Tony and others?

[Philippe Maquet]

Hi Bharat,

I am planning on taking the exam in about 3 to 4 weeks timeframe. How about you?

Hopefully next week.

I am also using Soft-learn systems exam simulator. Pretty useful and interesting stuff.

I bought it but didn't try it yet. I do prefer to keep them for after study, when I'll feel that I am ready.

p.s We should get our buddies from SCJD to join us here. I think Andrew has already taken this exam. Vlad, Tony and others?

Mmh... Hope they'll stay a bit on the SCJD forum because I'll have to go back there soon, when I am done with this little SCBCD-break I took in the middle of my SCJD assignment !
Best,
Phil.

[Jef Kelly]

Is there an EJBSharpenD.pdf? The last file peters out after page 497 in HFEJB. Is this final collection of answers in the works, unnecessary, or merely hidden from the unitiated?

Originally posted by Kathy Sierra:
Howdy all... just wanted you to know (whether you have the book or not) that we've posted both the Sharpen your Pencil PDFs and a jar of code to our site at:

Head First EJB page