Java power tools - John Ferguson Smart

All true craftsmen need the best tools to do their finest work, and programmers are no different. Java Power Tools delivers 30 open source tools designed to improve the development practices of Java developers in any size team or organization. Each chapter includes a series of short articles about one particular tool -- whether it's for build systems, version control, or other aspects of the development process -- giving you the equivalent of 30 short reference books in one package.

No matter which development method your team chooses, whether it's Agile, RUP, XP, SCRUM, or one of many others available, Java Power Tools provides practical techniques and tools to help you optimize the process. The book discusses key Java development problem areas and best practices, and focuses on open source tools that can help increase productivity in each area of the development cycle, including:

• Build tools including Ant and Maven 2
• Version control tools such as CVS and Subversion, the two most prominent open source tools
• Quality metrics tools that measure different aspects of code quality, including CheckStyle, PMD, FindBugs and Jupiter
• Technical documentation tools that can help you generate good technical documentation without spending too much effort writing and maintaining it
• Unit Testing tools including JUnit 4, TestNG, and the open source coverage tool Cobertura
• Integration, Load and Performance Testing to integrate performance tests into unit tests, load-test your application, and automatically test web services, Swing interfaces and web interfaces
• Issue management tools including Bugzilla and Trac
• Continuous Integration tools such as Continuum, Cruise Control, LuntBuild and Hudson

If you are a Java developer, these tools can help improve your development practices, and make your life easier in the process. Lead developers, software architects and people interested in the wider picture will be able to gather from these pages some useful ideas about improving your project infrastructure and best practices.

John is a freelance consultant specializing in Enterprise Java, Web Development, and Open Source technologies, currently based in Wellington, New Zealand. Well known in the Java community for his many published articles, John helps organizations optimize their Java development processes and infrastructures and provides training and mentoring in open source technologies, SDLC tools, and agile development processes. John is principal consultant at Wakaleo Consulting (http://www.wakaleo.com), a company that provides consulting, training and mentoring services in Enterprise Java and Agile Development.