Some books review: Instant Apache Camel Messaging System,Learning Apache Karaf, and Instant Apache ServiceMix How-To
I’m pleased to be reviewer on new books published by Packt:
I received a “hard” copy from Packt (thanks for that), and I’m now able to do the review.
Instant Apache Camel Messaging System, by Evgeniy Sharapov. Published by Packt publishing in September 2013
This book is a good introduction to Camel. It covers Camel fundamentals.
What is Apache Camel
It’s a quick introduction about Camel, in only four pages. We have a good overview about Camel basics: what is a component, routes, contexts, EIPs, etc.
We have to see that as it is: it’s just a quick introduction. Don’t expect a lot of details about the Camel basics, it just provides a very high level overview.
Installation
To be honest, I don’t like this part. It focus mostly on using Maven with Camel: how to use Camel with Maven, integrate Camel in your IDE (Eclipse, or IntelliJ), usage of the archetypes.
I think it’s too much restrictive. I would have prefered a quick listing of the differents ways to install and use Camel: in a Karaf/ServiceMix container, in a Spring application context, in Tomcat or another application server, etc.
I’m afraid that some users will take “bad habits” reading this part.
Quickstart
This part goes in bit deeper about CamelContext and RouteBuilder. It’s a good chapter, but I would have focus a bit more about the DSL (at least Java, Spring, and Blueprint).
The example used is interesting as it uses different components, transformation, predicates and expressions.
It’s a really good introduction.
Conclusion
It’s a good introduction book, only for new Camel users. If you already know Camel, I’m afraid that you will be a disapointed and you won’t learn a lot.
If you are a Camel rookie rider, and you want to move forward quickly, with a “ready to use example”, this book is good one.
I would have expects more details on some key Camel features, especially the EIPs, and some real use cases on EIP with some components.
Learning Apache Karaf, by Jamie Goodyear, Johan Edstrom, Heath Kesler. Published by Packt publishing in October 2013
I helped a lot on this book and I would like to congratulate my friends Jamie Goodyear, Johan Edstrom, Heath Kesler. You did a great job guys !
It’s the perfect book to start with Apache Karaf. All Karaf features are introduced, and more, like Karaf Cellar.
It’s based on Karaf 2.x (an update will be required for Karaf 3.0.0 as a lot of commands, etc changed).
The global content is great for beginner. If you already know Karaf, you probably know most of the content, however, the book can be helpful to discover some features like Cellar.
Good job guys !
Instant Apache ServiceMix How-To, by Henryk Konsek. Published by Packt publishing in June 2013
This book is a good complement from the Camel and Karaf ones. Unfortunately, some chapters are a bit redondent: you will find the same information in both books.
However, as Apache ServiceMix is powered by Karaf, starting from Learning Apache Karaf makes sense and give you details about the core of ServiceMix (the “ServiceMix Kernel”, which is the genesis of Karaf ;)).
This book is a good jump to ServiceMix.
I would have expect some details about some ServiceMix NMR (naming for instance), the different distributions.
ServiceMix is more than an umbrella project gathering Karaf, Camel, CXF, ActiveMQ, etc. It also provides some interesting features like Naming, etc. It would have been great to introduce this.
Conclusion
These three books are great for beginners, especially the Karaf one.
I was really glad and pleased to review these books. It’s a really a tough job to write this kind of books, and we have to congratulate the authors for their job.
It’s a great work guys !
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