a cupful of Java!

Sun Certified Programmer for Java 2 Platform 1.2 (CX-310-035)

I recently gave this exam (and cleared it, ofcourse). This exam is the first step in the series of certifications aimed at making you an 'in demand' programmer.
For preparing for this examination, I made some notes, which others have found really useful.
Note though, it assumes a basic familiarity with the Java Language.

The book to refer is "A Programer's Guide to Java Certification, Pearson Education" by Khalid Mughal and Rolf Rasmussen

View the SCJP 1.4 Guide

Also refer to sun's site for the latest objectives SCJP Objectives

Sun Certified Web Component Developer 1.4 (CX-310-081)

This is the next step in the J2EE path. I am as of now preparing for this. You should see a link to its notes here pretty soon.
The book I'd highly recommend for the same is "Head First Servlets and JSP, O'Reilly Publications" by Bryan Basham, Kathy Sierra and Bert Bates. It has a very unique interface, which I (and many others believe is most effective). If you're serious about this exam, this book is a must.

Also refer to sun's site for the latest objectives SCWCS Objectives

JavaRanch

If you havent seen this before, you're obviously pretty new to this game. It's the best place to get all sorts of Java help. Check it out. (A tip : do practice all the mock tests here and write some code!)

Great Free Resources

For all those disinclined towards spending any more cash (the exam voucher is not exactly cheap) would be delighted to know that almost everything you need to know you can get for free! (to start with, you got my notes didn't u?)

Check out this site for some really useful e-books on this topic which should help you get started.

Another awesome free resource is IBM developerWorks.

Project

I am presently working on an e-Governance project (model) for Delhi, India. it is called e-Suvidha. The documentation and the source code will soon be made available here as well as on freshmeat.com. It is a good example of how to integrate Servlets, JSP, EJBs and XML into an efficient project. If you are really keen on getting headsup info on this project, send a mail to the developers at esuvidhateam@rediffmail.com