Chapter 2 – 2

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 Text File I/O
• Important classes for text file output (to the file)
– PrintWriter
– FileOutputStream [or FileWriter]
• Important classes for text file input (from the file):
– BufferedReader
– FileReader
• FileOutputStream and FileReader take file names as arguments.
• PrintWriter and BufferedReader provide useful methods for
easier writing and reading.
• Usually need a combination of two classes
• To use these classes your program needs a line like the following:
import java.io.*;

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 Text File Output
• To open a text file for output: connect a text file to a stream for
writing

PrintWriter outputStream =
new PrintWriter(new FileOutputStream("out.txt"));

• Similar to the long way:

FileOutputStream s = new FileOutputStream("out.txt");
PrintWriter outputStream = new PrintWriter(s);

• Goal: create a PrintWriter object

– which uses FileOutputStream to open a text file
• FileOutputStream “connects” PrintWriter to a text file.
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 Methods for PrintWriter
• Similar to methods for System.out
• println

outputStream.println(count + " " + line);

• print
• format
• flush: write buffered output to disk
• close: close the PrintWriter stream (and file)

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Example
public static void main(String[] args)
{
PrintWriter outputStream = null;
try
{
outputStream = new PrintWriter(new
FileOutputStream("out.txt"));
}
catch(FileNotFoundException e)
{
System.out.println("Error opening the file out.txt. “
+ e.getMessage());
System.exit(0);
}

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System.out.println("Enter three lines of text:");
String line = null;
int count;
for (count = 1; count <= 3; count++)
{
line = keyboard.nextLine();
outputStream.println(count + " " + line);
}
outputStream.close();
System.out.println("... written to out.txt.");
}

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Overwriting a File
• Opening an output file creates an empty file
• Opening an output file creates a new file if it does not already exist
• Opening an output file that already exists eliminates the old file and creates a new, empty one
- data in the original file is lost
• To add/append to a file instead of replacing it, use a different constructor for
outputStream = new PrintWriter(new FileOutputStream("out.txt", true));

Closing a File

• An output file should be closed when you are done writing to it.
• Use the close method of the class PrintWriter (BufferedReader also has a close
method).
• For example, to close the file opened in the previous example:
outputStream.close();
• If a program ends normally it will close any files that are open.
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 Text File Input
• To open a text file for input: connect a text file to a stream for reading

– Goal: a BufferedReader object,

• which uses FileReader to open a text file

– FileReader “connects” BufferedReader to the text file

• For example:

BufferedReader xyz = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(“xyz.txt"));

• Similarly, the long way:

FileReader s = new FileReader(“smiley.txt");

BufferedReader smileyInStream = new BufferedReader(s);

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 Methods for BufferedReader
• readLine: read a line into a String

• no methods to read numbers directly, so read

numbers as Strings and then convert them
(StringTokenizer later)

• read: read a char at a time

• close: close BufferedReader stream

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 Reading Words in a String:
Using StringTokenizer Class
• There are BufferedReader methods to read a line and a
character, but not just a single word
• StringTokenizer can be used to parse a line into words
– import java.util.*
– you can specify delimiters (the character or characters that
separate words)
• the default delimiters are "white space" (space, tab, and
newline)

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 Testing for End of File in a Text File
• When readLine tries to read beyond the end of a text file it returns the
special value null - so you can test for null to stop processing a text file

• read returns -1 when it tries to read beyond the end of a text file

• Neither of these two methods (read and readLine) will throw an

EOFException.
int count = 0;
String line = inputStream.readLine();
while (line != null)
{
count++;
outputStream.println(count + " " + line);
line = inputStream.readLine();
} 11
 File Class [java.io]
• A file name like "numbers.txt" has only String properties
• File class has some very useful methods
– exists: tests if a file already exists
– canRead: tests if the OS will let you read a file
– canWrite: tests if the OS will let you write to a file
– delete: deletes the file, returns true if successful
– length: returns the number of bytes in the file
– getName: returns file name, excluding the preceding path
– getPath: returns the path name—the full name
File numFile = new File(“numbers.txt”);
if (numFile.exists())
System.out.println(numfile.length());
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 Alternative with Scanner
• Instead of BufferedReader with
FileReader, then StringTokenizer
• Use Scanner with File:

Scanner inFile = new Scanner(new File(“in.txt”));

• Similar to Scanner with System.in:

Scanner keyboard = new Scanner(System.in);

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Reading in int
Scanner inFile = new Scanner(new File(“in.txt"));
int number;
while (inFile.hasInt())
{
number = inFile.nextInt();
// …
}
Reading in lines of characters
Scanner inFile = new Scanner(new File(“in.txt"));
String line;
while (inFile.hasNextLine())
{
line = inFile.nextLine();
// …
} 14
 BufferedReader vs Scanner
(parsing primitive types)
• Scanner

– nextInt(), nextFloat(), … for parsing types

• BufferedReader

– read(), readLine(), … none for parsing types

– needs StringTokenizer then wrapper class methods

like Integer.parseInt(token)

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 BufferedReader vs Scanner
(Checking End of File/Stream (EOF))
• BufferedReader
– readLine() returns null
– read() returns -1
• Scanner
– nextLine() throws exception
– needs hasNextLine() to check first
– nextInt(), hasNextInt(), …

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 Opening a New Output File
• The file name is given as a String
– file name rules are determined by your operating system
• Opening an output file takes two steps
1. Create a FileOutputStream object associated with the file
name String
2. Connect the FileOutputStream to an
ObjectOutputStream object
• This can be done in one line of code
• To open a file named numbers.dat:
ObjectOutputStream outputStream =
new ObjectOutputStream(
new FileOutputStream("numbers.dat"));

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• Writing a Character to a File
– just cast the character to an int
– For example, to write the character 'A' to the file opened previously:
outputStream.writeChar((int) 'A');
– Or, just use the automatic conversion from char to int
• Writing a boolean Value to a File
• boolean values can be either of two values, true or false
• For example, to write the boolean value false to the output file:
outputStream.writeBoolean(false);
• Writing Strings to a File:
• Use the writeUTF method to output a value of type String
– there is no writeString method
• UTF stands for Unicode Text Format
– a special version of Unicode

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 Opening a New Input File
• Similar to opening an output file, but replace "output" with "input"

• The file name is given as a String

– file name rules are determined by your operating system

• Opening a file takes two steps

1. Creating a FileInputStream object associated with the file name String

2. Connecting the FileInputStream to an ObjectInputStream object

• This can be done in one line of code

• To open a file named numbers.dat:

ObjectInputStream inStream =
new ObjectInputStream (new FileInputStream("numbers.dat"));

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 Summary
• Text files contain strings of printable characters; they look intelligible to
humans when opened in a text editor.
• Binary files contain numbers or data in non-printable codes; they look
unintelligible to humans when opened in a text editor.
• Java can process both binary and text files, but binary files are more
common when doing file I/O.
• The class ObjectOutputStream is used to write output to a binary
file.
• The class ObjectInputStream is used to read input from a binary
file.
• Always check for the end of the file when reading from a file. The way
you check for end-of-file depends on the method you use to read from
the file.
• A file name can be read from the keyboard into a String variable and
the variable used in place of a file name.
• The class File has methods to test if a file exists and if it is read- and/or
write-enabled.
• Serializable class objects can be written to a binary file.
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 End of Ch.4
Questions, Ambiguities, Doubts, … ???

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