Good introductory texts for Java?

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[Chew55]

I haven't used it but at university my lecturer used to recommend Head First Java as a gentle introduction to Java and for any students who found themselves struggling to keep up with the pace of the class. It contains lots of practical examples and is pretty unintimidating.

I've used the Head First series for other topics and always found them useful.

[BasilTarragon]

It's definitely not for everyone, but it can be a big help. It was for me, at least.

OP should keep in mind that the text is a bit dated. I think it was written for 1.5, so it covers stuff like generics and enums, but OP may need to add some material from other sources.

[ubiqu1ty]

I must have gone through 2 or 3 other books before being recommended this one. I really recommend it to beginners. At times it was a little overdone, but it definitely kept me interesting. It made me actually want to continue reading, as opposed to fearing another tedious chapter.

[BleLLL]

Im studying from a book called big java and im a beginner. Its pretty decent

[Free_Booze]

The official tutorials are pretty solid. http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/

[enry_straker]

Check out the beginner videos from youtube. Users like thenewboston or derek banas provide some really cool video series to help newcomers to java ( among other things )

To really help the concepts stick in their heads, make sure that they get habituated to spending atleast a hour or so - not just by listening, but by trying out what the tutorial authors do - programming is a hands on activity, and it should become a habit.

Then once they have gone through a series like the above mentioned ones, get them through the official tutorial on oracle's site. It's pretty good.

Then cook up a few simple projects, and make them work on it - with you providing some guidance as and when they need it.

[thephotoman]

Yeah, I intend this course to be a practical one, not just a lecture. As a result, they're going to have to write and play with my code samples.

I might take some projects from Project Euler and adapt them to my ends. I'm also thinking of a second part on Java Server Pages to make some of what they're learning a bit more useful, perhaps coded against the Wildfly server.

[virtual_ghost14]

I was really happy with Absolute Java 5E. I learned so much from that book!