[Dogstopper]

Actually, you CAN do threads with Swing...It's just way beyond the scope of most programmers. Actually, Java is becoming quite common for Game Programming (integrating with Swing's event loop). One of the most popular Java game is Runescape. Much of it is written using Swing (actually JOGL, so maybe AWT). Nonetheless, Java is becoming a major contender in the gaming community - it just so happens that it is a new player, as only with the recent virtual machine optimizations has it matched (or even beat) C++ code. Of course, bad Java is bound to run slowly.

BUT, you have hit a point with your statement - Sun does not its own gaming platform and as Java works on any system with a JVM, it would make sense that it should, but as I said, Java is new to the high-games world and I do forsee it eventually being one of the immediate choices for even Desktop games. It has dominated web gaming for years, but like I said, new JVM optimizations will make it even better for full desktop applications.

So, until you're super advanced, just use Timer with maybe DoubleBuffering strategies. It should be just as good as any other language.

[wpdaddy7]

Thanks for this layout. It is a good guide for a newbie like myself. I just completed my first course in Java this past semester and would place myself at 2. I have a lot of work to do to get better. I have learned quite a bit more on here and a couple of other places online than I learned in class.

[macosxnerd101]

Then I'd say you are right on track. Completing through stage 2 is on par with what is covered in the AP Computer Science and College Programming Intro classes.

I'm glad you've found my guide to be helpful.

[Luckless]

I would definitely say I'm working on a 3 because I've never taken a Data Structures and Algorithms class, even though I'm fairly competent with most of the Data Structures. I can't wait for next semester-- My professor is Dr. Liang. He's written over 30 text books on Java and is an absolute master =)

This post has been edited by Luckless: 20 May 2010 - 06:43 AM

[m-e-g-a-z]

I believe im at stage 3 (covered 85% of topics on there) going onto stage 4 within a few months.

I will need to increase my book shelf this summer for more programming materials


Edit: Also, what about putting Recursion into stage 2?

This post has been edited by m-e-g-a-z: 21 May 2010 - 04:31 PM

[cfoley]

I just typed this out but it seems to have gone missing.

I wouldn't get too caught up in the exact order in the list. There are some examples such as class design that appear early on which you will continually improve in over your whole programming career. Most CS students will do many/all of the stage 3 and 4 items too but may never work on a large project with other people's legacy code (stage 2) until they get a job. Furthermore, your interests and requirements may take you in different directions. I've done a fair amount of multithreading but not much databases. Those are just the directions my interests took me.

[UrbanTwitch]

Bahaha, I hit Databases for Java head on while I was a noob. Learning the JDBC was easier because I already knew MySQL but the hard part was the "Java" part... mostly getting the hiearchy right. But I'm still a noob at this. I got the basic down so I guess I'm somewhere in Stage 2.

[geniainsoup]

Oh no, I'm hanging in stage 3.
Can't help myself on my image processing project.

[Brewer]

I'm chillin at stage two for the time being. Hopefully the two CS courses I am taking next semester (Introduction to Computer Science and Object-Oriented Programming I) will knock me up to stage three. Thanks for the post macosxnerd101!

[ondawall]

I have only started learning java, having taken two college level courses to date. Please know how much posts such as this are appreciated. They give green horns like myself, some idea of how to formulate a training path. Good information, sir. Thank you.

[xDrayS]

Nice information mac. Thanks very much. I fall into Stage 1 right now. I have studied C++ a bit but not all that much. I am currently looking to learn Java before moving into anything else. I am reading many tutorials on here and other helpful info. +1 for showing me a bit on how to progress.

[macosxnerd101]

Glad you all found the thread helpful!

[amt786786]

hi
There am a student in ict in uni and i am finding it diffcult to get my head around java and was wondering if you will help me? i understand upto Stage 2 but i find it hard to know how to read a question on java and understand what i need to input if you get to me? anyone out there to help me plz
thanks

[nick2price]

Its difficult to say where I am at, because I know most of the stuff in all four categories, while at the same time there are things I have not yet looked into. I think my next step is to go into threading, as I have always put this off. For some strange reason, this topic does not seem to interest me. However, I completed a large project whiched used so much jdbc, so I am quite comfortable with this. And to those who say its simple, obviously you havnt got into very complicated inner joins etc (hard enough in sql itself, even hard concatinating the correct statement in java).

So, the obvious question now is Mac, when you creating a tutorial for every topic on the list?

[macosxnerd101]

LOL! Probably not anytime soon for all those topics. I was hoping you guys would write some of those tutorials as well.