revised: 02/18/99, 01/31/00, 05/20/02, 01/09/06

CHAPTER 5 — Introduction to Java

The previous chapters have discussed computer hardware, computer software, bits and bytes, machine language, language translation, language interpretation, and virtual machines. This chapter assumes that you know all that and are ready to look at Java.

Chapter Topics:

These notes are written for Java 2 Standard Edition version JSE5.0 or higher. Many features were added to this edition and previous versions will not work as well with these notes.

QUESTION 1:

Is it necessary to spend lots of money to get Java?