Our look is the result of reader comments, our own experimentation, and feedback from distribution channels. Distinctive covers complement our distinctive approach to technical topics, breathing personality and life into potentially dry subjects.

The animal on the cover of Java Extreme Programming Cookbook is a bison. American Bison (Bison bison) are the largest land mammals in North America. Prior to European colonization, an estimated 30 to 70 million animals roamed the continent in vast herds. Bison were recklessly overhunted until, in the late 1800s, approximately 1,500 remained. Now bison are legally protected in Yellowstone National Park and on preserves such as the National Bison Refuge in Montana. The development of commercial bison ranching has also played a role in increasing the North American Bison population, which has grown to over 350,000 animals.

Colleen Gorman was the production editor and the copyeditor for Java Extreme Programming Cookbook. Mary Brady, Brian Sawyer, and Mary Anne Weeks Mayo provided quality control. Tom Dinse wrote the index.

Hanna Dyer designed the cover of this book, based on a series design by Edie Freedman. The cover image is a 19th-century engraving from the Dover Pictorial Archive. Emma Colby produced the cover layout with QuarkXPress 4.1 using Adobe's ITC Garamond font.

Bret Kerr designed the interior layout, based on a series design by David Futato. This book was converted by Joe Wizda to FrameMaker 5.5.6 with a format conversion tool created by Erik Ray, Jason McIntosh, Neil Walls, and Mike Sierra that uses Perl and XML technologies. The text font is Linotype Birka; the heading font is Adobe Myriad Condensed; and the code font is LucasFont's TheSans Mono Condensed. The illustrations that appear in the book were produced by Robert Romano and Jessamyn Read using Macromedia FreeHand 9 and Adobe Photoshop 6. This colophon was written by Colleen Gorman.

The online edition of this book was created by the Safari production group (John Chodacki, Becki Maisch, and Madeleine Newell) using a set of Frame-to-XML conversion and cleanup tools written and maintained by Erik Ray, Benn Salter, John Chodacki, and Jeff Liggett.