File Handling

in Java

Dr.Rab Nawaz Jadoon

Department of Computer Science Assistant Professor
COMSATS University, Abbottabad
DCS Pakistan
COMSATS University, Islamabad
(Abbottabad Campus)

Object Oriented Programming (OOP)

 File handling in Java
◼ File handling is an important part of any
application.
◼ The File class from the java.io package, allows
us to work with files.
◼ To use the File class, create an object of the
class, and specify the filename or directory
name.
◼ Example
❖ On the next slide

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 Cont…

1. Java File class represents the files and directory pathnames

in an abstract manner.
2. This class is used for creation of files and directories, file
searching, file deletion, etc.
3. The File object represents the actual file/directory on the
disk.

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 File Class Methods

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 Java Create and Write To Files
◼ To create a file in Java, you can use the
createNewFile() method.
◼ This method returns a boolean value: true if the
file was successfully created, and false if the file
already exists.
◼ Note that the method is enclosed in a try...catch
block.
◼ This is necessary because it throws an
IOException if an error occurs (if the file cannot
be created for some reason):

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 JAVA File Operation Method

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 Creating a File

File created: filename.txt

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 Writing File to a Specific Directory
◼ To create a file in a specific directory (requires
permission), specify the path of the file and use
double backslashes to escape the "\" character
(for Windows).
◼ On Mac and Linux you can just write the path,
like: /Users/name/filename.txt
File myObj = new File("C:\\Users\\MyName\\filename.txt");

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 Write to a File
◼ In the following example, we use the FileWriter
class together with its write() method to write
some text to the file we created in the example
above.
◼ Note that when you are done writing to the file,
you should close it with the close() method:

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 Example Program

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 Read a File
❖ In the following example, we use the Scanner class
to read the contents of the text file.

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 Getting File Information
◼ To get more information about a file, use any of
the File methods:

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 Deleting a File

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 Listing all files in a Folder
import java.io.File;
abc.class
abc.java
AgeCalculator.class
AgeCalculator.java
public class ListFilesinFolder ascii.class
ascii.java

{ CheckEvenOdd.class
CheckEvenOdd.java
comsats.class

public static void main(String[] args) comsats.java

CountFilesinFolder.class
CountFilesinFolder.java
{ CreateFile.class
CreateFile.java
DiceRoller.class
int count=0; DiceRoller.java
Dog.class
example1.class
// creates a file object example1.java
ExampleThrows.class

File file = new File("C:\\Users\\Rab Nawaz\\Desktop\\JAVA"); ExampleThrows.java

exceptions.class
exceptions.java
Factorial.class
Factorial.java
filename.txt
// returns an array of all files GradeBook.java
GradeBookTest.java
hs_err_pid3692.log
String[] fileList = file.list(); hs_err_pid3832.log
hs_err_pid4136.log
jadoon.java
khan.java
lab.class

for(String str : fileList) lab.java

Movieshop.class
Movieshop.java

{ MyClass.class
MyClass.java
Pet.class
System.out.println(str); RefVarofTypeInterface.class
RefVarofTypeInterface.java
RollDie.class
count++; RollDie.java
s1.class
s1.java
} Student.class
StudentTest.class

System.out.println(“Total Files:” +count); StudentTest.java

WriteToFile.class
WriteToFile.java

} xyz.class
xyz.java
Total Files: 53
}

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 FileInputStream
◼ A FileInputStream obtains input bytes from a
file in a file system.
◼ What files are available depends on the host
environment.
◼ FileInputStream is meant for reading streams of
raw bytes such as image data.
◼ For reading streams of characters, consider
using FileReader.

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 Counting Number of Characters in a
file

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 Cont…

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 Cont…

Output

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