Question for Jim Keogh.

[James Drinkard]

Hello Jim,
I saw the email for your new book: "Java Demystified". It's a unique title. I assume there was a group of people you had in mind when you wrote the book. Is it for people that don't know programming already and with all the java books out there, what makes yours different than the rest?

[Chengwei Lee]

Hi James,

The author shares the same name as you He's James Keogh. BTW, McGraw-Hill seems to be releasing a series of "demystified" books. Other than Java Demystified, they also have Databases Demystified & OOP Demystified (also by James).

[Ko Ko Naing]

But, Cheng Wei Lee, his name is Jim on the Amazon's page. But I googled the name of the book and I found some sites mentioned the author's name as Jim, some as James... I think they are his previous name and current name. I have no idea which one is the current one.

There are many books written by James(Jim) Keogh. We can find all of them at Amazon and here is the link to Jim's published books.

[Ernest Friedman-Hill]

"Jim" and "James" are the same name. Jim is a nickname -- a short or informal version of James.

[Ko Ko Naing]

Oh! Thank you Dr.Ernest. Both Cheng Wei Lee and I are asians and we are not familiar to the English naming that much...

In the past, I think that
Tim is shortform of Timothy
Jim is shortform of Jimmy
The shortform of a name is fetched from starting words...

Cool... I got a new native English knowledge today...

[Chengwei Lee]

Originally posted by Ernest Friedman-Hill:
"Jim" and "James" are the same name. Jim is a nickname -- a short or informal version of James.

Ohhh, I see, I see. Thanks for pointing out!

[Jonathan King]

I also have a question for you, James. In Java Demystified, do you present your programming topics and examples as if coding and running them through a console window, or is there some sort of GUI java program that you use throughout the book? (Bluebird, for example?)

[Jim Keogh]

Jim and James issues goes back to my first book in 1971 (OK I'm not as young as I think I am but when you write books you soon find out that your birth year is published in every library). Any way, I used James Keogh as the by line of my first book. I used James Edward Keogh as the byline for a few others. For the last couple of decades I've been using Jim Keogh. However, Amazon and most libraries and book sellers use a file supplied by the Library of Congress for author information - and as it would have it the the Library of Congress uses James Keogh. Publishers try to correct it on the online sites, but they I end up with Jim Keogh, James Keogh, and James Edward Keogh listed. And to make matters worse, there is a James Keogh who use to be an editor at Time Magazine and who worked for Nixon in the White House - and who writes books. Bottom line I've given up trying to fight the Library of Congress - so that's the story about the names. I've written about 60 books so far - more to come. As for the demystified series, the series is designed to give beginners to Java programming a simplified introduction to the language. Someone new to programming can use this book - and someone new to Java can also use it, but they'd probably skip a few chapters since some of the basic java programming is the same as in other languages.

Jim Keogh