[ale] good website for novice learning Java ?

[Jim Sculley]

Courtney Thomas wrote:
> I know Sun has a ton of stuff re:java but I'm lookin' for
> a beginner's site that is more navigable and transparent.

Hmmmm.

http://java.sun.com/docs/books/tutorial/information/download.html

I've been writing Java for various (small) work and largish hobby 
projects for about 7 years.  I am self-taught.  I started with the above 
tutorial and a single book 'Java 1.1 - The Complete Reference' from the 
Osborne press.  They've released newer versions since then of course. 
USENET and the Java Forums at http://forum.java.sun.com/index.jspa are 
an invaluable resource for getting questions answered.  In seven years 
I've probably had less than 10 questions and/or problems that had not 
been asked and answered by others, many times over.

Whether or not Java is right for you depends on what you are trying to 
accomplish.  I've dabbled in just about every aspect of it with the 
exception of the full-on enterprise (EJB) stuff.  I haven't found 
anything I couldn't do with it.

Jim Sculley