Dear Friend,
I think the best way to start with the book 'Head First Java',
If you already gone through the same start coding in notepad and run the program,
dont use eclipse or any other ides for learning coding,use notepad type the code and run ,after first success start using the ides, when you use the ide they suggest almost all the syntax needed you will not study about the compile time errors deeply,
google hello world program in java as initial program.
tools/software requirements for java program,
jdk 1.6 (java 6th edition)
notepad
second level
ide eclipse,netbeans,intellij anyone of these
jdk mentioned above,
good to have account in stackoverflow website, it gives almost all queries regarding the errors,issues