How to really read text file from classpath in Jav

Question

I am trying to read a text file which is set in CLASSPATH system variable. Not a user variable.

I am trying to get input stream to the file as below:

Place the directory of file (D:\myDir)in CLASSPATH and try below:

InputStream in = this.getClass().getClassLoader().getResourceAsStream("SomeTextFile.txt");
InputStream in = this.getClass().getClassLoader().getResourceAsStream("/SomeTextFile.txt");
InputStream in = this.getClass().getClassLoader().getResourceAsStream("//SomeTextFile.txt");

Place full path of file (D:\myDir\SomeTextFile.txt)in CLASSPATH and try the same above 3 lines of code.

But unfortunately NONE of them are working and I am always getting null into my InputStream in.

Answer 1

Don't use getClassLoader() method and use the "/" before the file name. "/" is very important

this.getClass().getResourceAsStream("/SomeTextFile.txt");

Answer 2

you have to put your 'system variable' on the java classpath.

Answer 3

To read the contents of a file into a String from the classpath, you can use this:

private String resourceToString(String filePath) throws IOException, URISyntaxException
{
    try (InputStream inputStream = this.getClass().getClassLoader().getResourceAsStream(filePath))
    {
        return IOUtils.toString(inputStream);
    }
}

Note:
IOUtils is part of Commons IO.

Call it like this:

String fileContents = resourceToString("ImOnTheClasspath.txt");

Answer 4

Scenario:

1) client-service-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar has dependency read-classpath-resource-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar

2) we want to read content of class path resources (sample.txt) of read-classpath-resource-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar through client-service-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar.

3) read-classpath-resource-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar has src/main/resources/sample.txt

Here is working sample code I prepared, after 2-3days wasting my development time, I found the complete end-to-end solution, hope this helps to save your time

1.pom.xml of read-classpath-resource-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
        <project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
            <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
            <groupId>jar-classpath-resource</groupId>
            <artifactId>read-classpath-resource</artifactId>
            <version>1.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
            <name>classpath-test</name>
            <properties>
                <project.build.sourceEncoding>UTF-8</project.build.sourceEncoding>
                <org.springframework.version>4.3.3.RELEASE</org.springframework.version>
                <mvn.release.plugin>2.5.1</mvn.release.plugin>
                <output.path>${project.artifactId}</output.path>
                <io.dropwizard.version>1.0.3</io.dropwizard.version>
                <commons-io.verion>2.4</commons-io.verion>
            </properties>
            <dependencies>
                <dependency>
                    <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
                    <artifactId>spring-core</artifactId>
                    <version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
                </dependency>
                <dependency>
                    <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
                    <artifactId>spring-context</artifactId>
                    <version>${org.springframework.version}</version>
                </dependency>
                <dependency>
                    <groupId>commons-io</groupId>
                    <artifactId>commons-io</artifactId>
                    <version>${commons-io.verion}</version>
                </dependency>
            </dependencies>
            <build>
                <resources>
                    <resource>
                        <directory>src/main/resources</directory>
                    </resource>
                </resources>
                <plugins>
                    <plugin>
                        <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                        <artifactId>maven-release-plugin</artifactId>
                        <version>${mvn.release.plugin}</version>
                    </plugin>
                    <plugin>
                        <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                        <artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
                        <version>3.1</version>
                        <configuration>
                            <source>1.8</source>
                            <target>1.8</target>
                            <encoding>UTF-8</encoding>
                        </configuration>
                    </plugin>
                    <plugin>
                        <artifactId>maven-jar-plugin</artifactId>
                        <version>2.5</version>
                        <configuration>
                            <outputDirectory>${project.build.directory}/lib</outputDirectory>
                            <archive>
                                <manifest>
                                    <addClasspath>true</addClasspath>
                                    <useUniqueVersions>false</useUniqueVersions>
                                    <addDefaultImplementationEntries>true</addDefaultImplementationEntries>
                                    <mainClass>demo.read.classpath.resources.ClassPathResourceReadTest</mainClass>
                                </manifest>
                                <manifestEntries>
                                    <Implementation-Artifact-Id>${project.artifactId}</Implementation-Artifact-Id>
                                    <Class-Path>sample.txt</Class-Path>
                                </manifestEntries>
                            </archive>
                        </configuration>
                    </plugin>
                    <plugin>
                        <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                        <artifactId>maven-shade-plugin</artifactId>
                        <version>2.2</version>
                        <configuration>
                            <createDependencyReducedPom>false</createDependencyReducedPom>
                            <filters>
                                <filter>
                                    <artifact>*:*</artifact>
                                    <excludes>
                                        <exclude>META-INF/*.SF</exclude>
                                        <exclude>META-INF/*.DSA</exclude>
                                        <exclude>META-INF/*.RSA</exclude>
                                    </excludes>
                                </filter>
                            </filters>
                        </configuration>
                        <executions>
                            <execution>
                                <phase>package</phase>
                                <goals>
                                    <goal>shade</goal>
                                </goals>
                                <configuration>
                                    <transformers>
                                        <transformer implementation="org.apache.maven.plugins.shade.resource.ServicesResourceTransformer" />
                                        <transformer implementation="org.apache.maven.plugins.shade.resource.ManifestResourceTransformer">
                                            <mainClass>demo.read.classpath.resources.ClassPathResourceReadTest</mainClass>
                                        </transformer>
                                    </transformers>
                                </configuration>
                            </execution>
                        </executions>
                    </plugin>
                </plugins>
            </build>
        </project>

2.ClassPathResourceReadTest.java class in read-classpath-resource-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar that loads the class path resources file content.

package demo.read.classpath.resources;

import java.io.BufferedReader;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import java.io.InputStreamReader;
import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.List;

public final class ClassPathResourceReadTest {
    public ClassPathResourceReadTest() throws IOException {
        InputStream inputStream = getClass().getResourceAsStream("/sample.txt");
        BufferedReader reader = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(inputStream));
        List<Object> list = new ArrayList<>();
        String line;
        while ((line = reader.readLine()) != null) {
            list.add(line);
        }
        for (Object s1: list) {
            System.out.println("@@@ " +s1);
        }
        System.out.println("getClass().getResourceAsStream('/sample.txt') lines: "+list.size());
    }
}

3.pom.xml of client-service-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0"
         xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
         xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
    <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>

    <groupId>client-service</groupId>
    <artifactId>client-service</artifactId>
    <version>1.0-SNAPSHOT</version>

    <dependencies>
        <dependency>
            <groupId>jar-classpath-resource</groupId>
            <artifactId>read-classpath-resource</artifactId>
            <version>1.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
        </dependency>
    </dependencies>

    <build>
        <plugins>
            <plugin>
                <artifactId>maven-jar-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>2.5</version>
                <configuration>
                    <outputDirectory>${project.build.directory}/lib</outputDirectory>
                    <archive>
                        <manifest>
                            <addClasspath>true</addClasspath>
                            <useUniqueVersions>false</useUniqueVersions>
                            <addDefaultImplementationEntries>true</addDefaultImplementationEntries>
                            <mainClass>com.crazy.issue.client.AccessClassPathResource</mainClass>
                        </manifest>
                        <manifestEntries>
                            <Implementation-Artifact-Id>${project.artifactId}</Implementation-Artifact-Id>
                            <Implementation-Source-SHA>${buildNumber}</Implementation-Source-SHA>
                            <Class-Path>sample.txt</Class-Path>
                        </manifestEntries>
                    </archive>
                </configuration>
            </plugin>
            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                <artifactId>maven-shade-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>2.2</version>
                <configuration>
                    <createDependencyReducedPom>false</createDependencyReducedPom>
                    <filters>
                        <filter>
                            <artifact>*:*</artifact>
                            <excludes>
                                <exclude>META-INF/*.SF</exclude>
                                <exclude>META-INF/*.DSA</exclude>
                                <exclude>META-INF/*.RSA</exclude>
                            </excludes>
                        </filter>
                    </filters>
                </configuration>
                <executions>
                    <execution>
                        <phase>package</phase>
                        <goals>
                            <goal>shade</goal>
                        </goals>
                        <configuration>
                            <transformers>
                                <transformer implementation="org.apache.maven.plugins.shade.resource.ServicesResourceTransformer" />
                                <transformer implementation="org.apache.maven.plugins.shade.resource.ManifestResourceTransformer">
                                    <mainClass>com.crazy.issue.client.AccessClassPathResource</mainClass>
                                </transformer>
                            </transformers>
                        </configuration>
                    </execution>
                </executions>
            </plugin>
        </plugins>
    </build>
</project>

4.AccessClassPathResource.java instantiate ClassPathResourceReadTest.java class where, it is going to load sample.txt and prints its content also.

package com.crazy.issue.client;

import demo.read.classpath.resources.ClassPathResourceReadTest;
import java.io.IOException;

public class AccessClassPathResource {
    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
        ClassPathResourceReadTest test = new ClassPathResourceReadTest();
    }
}

5.Run Executable jar as follows:

[ravibeli@localhost lib]$ java -jar client-service-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar
****************************************
I am in resources directory of read-classpath-resource-1.0-SNAPSHOT.jar
****************************************
3) getClass().getResourceAsStream('/sample.txt'): 3

Answer 5

When using the Spring Framework (either as a collection of utilities or container - you do not need to use the latter functionality) you can easily use the Resource abstraction.

Resource resource = new ClassPathResource("com/example/Foo.class");

Through the Resource interface you can access the resource as InputStream, URL, URI or File. Changing the resource type to e.g. a file system resource is a simple matter of changing the instance.

Answer 6

With the directory on the classpath, from a class loaded by the same classloader, you should be able to use either of:

// From ClassLoader, all paths are "absolute" already - there's no context
// from which they could be relative. Therefore you don't need a leading slash.
InputStream in = this.getClass().getClassLoader()
                                .getResourceAsStream("SomeTextFile.txt");
// From Class, the path is relative to the package of the class unless
// you include a leading slash, so if you don't want to use the current
// package, include a slash like this:
InputStream in = this.getClass().getResourceAsStream("/SomeTextFile.txt");

If those aren't working, that suggests something else is wrong.

So for example, take this code:

package dummy;

import java.io.*;

public class Test
{
    public static void main(String[] args)
    {
        InputStream stream = Test.class.getResourceAsStream("/SomeTextFile.txt");
        System.out.println(stream != null);
        stream = Test.class.getClassLoader().getResourceAsStream("SomeTextFile.txt");
        System.out.println(stream != null);
    }
}

And this directory structure:

code
    dummy
          Test.class
txt
    SomeTextFile.txt

And then (using the Unix path separator as I'm on a Linux box):

java -classpath code:txt dummy.Test

Results:

true
true