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If you're new to Java (or programming), it's going to be important to learn how to read and understand the documentation in order to become self-reliant -- it's the first step to getting less dependent from other people, and in most cases, will improve your learning and programming speed.
The following are some tips and suggestions:
Get to know the Java API Specification.
At first, the Javadoc format of the API Specification seem a little bit underpowered without any search ability, but I've found that to be that being able to browse the documentation with a browser to be very powerful.
Since the Javadocs are just HTML files, they can be easily viewed and navigated in a browser, and bookmarking pages are easy as well. Also, the API Specification is available for download, so it not necessary to always go to the web to get information.
As the documentation is just web pages, using the Find feature of the browser can find information quickly in a page, and if that fails, using Google or your favorite search engine to find documentation is very fast and easy.
Google (or your favorite search engine) is your friend.
Need information on the StringBuilder class? Try the following query:
The first result will be the Java API Specification page for the StringBuilder class. The tip is to append the string "java 6" at the end of the query and that seems to bring the API Specification to the top most of the time.
Get comfortable with the structure of the AP