Direct from the creators of the Java(t) programming language, the completely revised fourth edition of The Java(t) Programming Language is an indispensable resource for novice and advanced programmers alike. Developers around the world have used previous editions to quickly gain a deep understanding of the Java programming language, its design goals, and how to use it most effectively in real-world development. Now, Ken Arnold, James Gosling, and David Holmes have updated this classic to reflect the major enhancements in Java(t) 2 Standard Edition 5.0 (J2SE(t) 5.0). The authors systematically cover most classes in Java,s main packages, java.lang.*, java.util, and java.io, presenting in-depth explanations of why these classes work as they do, with informative examples. Several new chapters and major sections have been added, and every chapter has been updated to reflect today,s best practices for building robust, efficient, and maintainable Java software. Key changes in this edition include * New chapters on generics, enums, and annotations, the most powerful new language features introduced in J2SE 5.0 * Changes to classes and methods throughout to reflect the addition of generics * Major new sections on assertions and regular expressions * Coverage of all the new language features, from autoboxing and variable argument methods to the enhanced for-loop and covariant return types * Coverage of key new classes, such as Formatter and Scanner The Java(t) Programming Language, Fourth Edition, is the definitive tutorial introduction to the Java language and essential libraries and an indispensable reference for all programmers, including those with extensive experience. It brings together insights you can only get from the creators of Java: insights that will help you write software of exceptional quality.

Ken Arnold 曾任 Sun 公司研究中心的高级工程师，是面向对象设计与实现方面首屈一指的专家。他曾经是 Jini 技术的架构师之一、 Sun 公司 JavaSpaces 技术的首席工程师。

James Gosling 是 Sun 公司院士和该公司开发平台组（ Developer Platform Group ）的 CTO 。他设计了 Java 程序设计语言，实现了最初的 Java 编译器和虚拟机，最近他正致力于 Java 实时规范（ Real-Time Specification for Java ）的相关工作。他是计算机界最受尊敬的程序员之一，曾荣获 Software Development 杂志评选的“程序设计杰出大奖”（1996 年）。

David Holmes 是澳大利亚布里斯班的 DLTech 公司的董事。他专攻同步与并发问题，是开发了最新的 Java 并发工具的 JSR-166 专家组的成员。他还参与了 Java 实时规范的修订工作，在过去的几年中他一直致力于该规范的实现工作。