On the bright side, the text is most of the times crystal clear, easy to understand and follow the code creation from scratch. The helpful appendix of the book guides the reader to setup the Sun Glassfish application server in minutes, without any trouble. Such easiness really tempts to switch your java integrated development environment (IDE ) to Sun Netbeans. The database scripts given are for Oracle though, not for Derby. The source code of the book runs correctly out of the box with only an exception as mentioned here:http://www.manning-sandbox.com/thread.jspa?threadID=37203&tstart=0
Apart from Glassfish, there are also many code versions, suitable for the older Oracle Application Server (oc4j),JBoss and weblogic 10.
On the dark side, the text is IDE neutral, the deployment is done using ant scripts. Many spelling errors also appeared in the text and the huge errata page at Manning site.
All in all, the book is highly recommended, I am looking forward to reading its newer, updated edition!
