The Java Coding Guidelines is organized into an introductory chapter and 75 guidelines organized into five additional chapters:
- Security
- Defensive Programming
- Best Practices
- Program Understandability
- Programmer Misconceptions
Guidelines have a consistent structure. The title of the guideline and the introductory paragraphs define the conformance requirements. This is typically followed by one or more pairs of noncompliant code examples and corresponding compliant solutions. Each guideline also includes an applicability section and bibliographical references specific to that guideline.
At the end, there is a common glossary and bibliography.