The Java Tutorials are practical guides for programmers who want to use the Java programming language to create applications. They include hundreds of complete, working examples, and dozens of lessons. Groups of related lessons are organized into "trails".
The Java Tutorials primarily describe features in Java SE 7. For best results, download JDK 7.
What's New
The Java Tutorials are continuously updated to keep up with changes to the Java Platform and to incorporate feedback from our readers. This release of the tutorial coincides with the release of JDK 7u45. Apart from fixing typos and errors, this update includes the following:
The Collections trail has been updated to recommend the preferred method of traversing collections with JDK 8: obtaining a stream and invoking its aggregate operations. Aggregate operations are often used in conjunction with lambda expressions to make programming more expressive, using less lines of code. The Collection, Set, List, and Map interface pages now contain examples that demonstrate this new language feature.
Additional manifest entries are described in Enhancing Security with Manifest Attributes. The launchable examples in the Java Tutorial have been updated to use these new attributes.
The JAXP trail has been updated with a new Processing Limits lesson.
The previous release of the tutorial, which corresponded to the JDK 7u40 release, included the following:
The release of the Date-Time trail as part of the early access JDK 8 tutorial updates. The Date-Time APIs, coming in JDK 8, are a result of the work from JSR 310 and provide a comprehensive model for date and time. The new trail covers the classes based on the standard ISO calendar system and includes info on converting date and time values to other calendar systems. There is also a Legacy Date-Time page on migrating from the java.util date classes to the new java.time APIs. You can download an early access release of JDK 8 from java.net.
The Aggregate Operations lesson has been added to the Collections trail. Aggregate data operations, a new feature coming in JDK 8, iterate over collections on your behalf, which enables you to write more concise and efficient code that processes elements stored in collections.
Running rich Internet applications (RIAs) through a browser can be risky for users due to the malicious intent of others looking for vulnerabilities through which to access a user's system. Guidelines for Securing Rich Internet Applications, in the Deployment trail, provide suggestions for making your RIAs less vulnerable to attack.
The Language Tag Filtering and Lookup page was added to the Setting the Locale lesson in the Internationalization trail. This page discusses language tags, languages ranges, and language priority lists. It also includes sections about language tag filtering and language tag lookup, with plenty of examples that you can compile and run.
The JAXP trail was updated with the JAXP 1.5 and New Properties lesson.
The download tutorial bundle, and the ebooks, available from the Java SE Tutorial download page, were updated for the 7u40 release.
Trails Covering the Basics
These trails are available in book form as The Java Tutorial, Fifth Edition. To buy this book, refer to the box to the right.
Getting Started — An introduction to Java technology and lessons on installing Java development software and using it to create a simple program.
Learning the Java Language — Lessons describing the essential concepts and features of the Java Programming Language.
Essential Java Classes — Lessons on exceptions, basic input/output, concurrency, regular expressions, and the platform environment.
Collections — Lessons on using and extending the Java Collections Framework.
Date-Time APIs — How to use the java.time pages to write date and time code.
Deployment — How to package applications and applets using JAR files, and deploy them using Java Web Start and Java Plug-in.
Preparation for Java Programming Language Certification — List of available training and tutorial resources.
Creating Graphical User Interfaces
Creating a GUI with Swing — A comprehensive introduction to GUI creation on the Java platform.
Creating a JavaFX GUI — A collection of JavaFX tutorials.
Specialized Trails and Lessons
These trails and lessons are only available as web pages.
Custom Networking — An introduction to the Java platform's powerful networking features.
The Extension Mechanism — How to make custom APIs available to all applications running on the Java platform.
Full-Screen Exclusive Mode API — How to write applications that more fully utilize the user's graphics hardware.
Generics — An enhancement to the type system that supports operations on objects of various types while providing compile-time type safety. Note that this lesson is for advanced users. The Java Language trail contains a Generics lesson that is suitable for beginners.
Internationalization — An introduction to designing software so that it can be easily be adapted (localized) to various languages and regions.
JavaBeans — The Java platform's component technology.
JDBC Database Access — Introduces an API for connectivity between the Java applications and a wide range of databases and a data sources.
JMX— Java Management Extensions provides a standard way of managing resources such as applications, devices, and services.
JNDI— Java Naming and Directory Interface enables accessing the Naming and Directory Service such as DNS and LDAP.
JAXP — Introduces the Java API for XML Processing (JAXP) technology.
JAXB — Introduces the Java architecture for XML Binding (JAXB) technology.
RMI — The Remote Method Invocation API allows an object to invoke methods of an object running on another Java Virtual Machine.
Reflection — An API that represents ("reflects") the classes, interfaces, and objects in the current Java Virtual Machine.
Security — Java platform features that help protect applications from malicious software.
Sound — An API for playing sound data from applications.
2D Graphics — How to display and print 2D graphics in applications.
Sockets Direct Protocol — How to enable the Sockets Direct Protocol to take advantage of InfiniBand.
