JavaTM 2 Platform
Std. Ed. v1.4.1

java.io
Class Reader

java.lang.Object
  |
  +--java.io.Reader
Direct Known Subclasses:
BufferedReader, CharArrayReader, FilterReader, InputStreamReader, PipedReader, StringReader

public abstract class Reader
extends Object

Abstract class for reading character streams. The only methods that a subclass must implement are read(char[], int, int) and close(). Most subclasses, however, will override some of the methods defined here in order to provide higher efficiency, additional functionality, or both.

Since:
JDK1.1
See Also:
BufferedReader, LineNumberReader, CharArrayReader, InputStreamReader, FileReader, FilterReader, PushbackReader, PipedReader, StringReader, Writer

Field Summary
protected  Object lock
          The object used to synchronize operations on this stream.
 
Constructor Summary
protected Reader()
          Create a new character-stream reader whose critical sections will synchronize on the reader itself.
protected Reader(Object lock)
          Create a new character-stream reader whose critical sections will synchronize on the given object.
 
Method Summary
abstract  void close()
          Close the stream.
 void mark(int readAheadLimit)
          Mark the present position in the stream.
 boolean markSupported()
          Tell whether this stream supports the mark() operation.
 int read()
          Read a single character.
 int read(char[] cbuf)
          Read characters into an array.
abstract  int read(char[] cbuf, int off, int len)
          Read characters into a portion of an array.
 boolean ready()
          Tell whether this stream is ready to be read.
 void reset()
          Reset the stream.
 long skip(long n)
          Skip characters.
 
Methods inherited from class java.lang.Object
clone, equals, finalize, getClass, hashCode, notify, notifyAll, toString, wait, wait, wait
 

Field Detail

lock

protected Object lock
The object used to synchronize operations on this stream. For efficiency, a character-stream object may use an object other than itself to protect critical sections. A subclass should therefore use the object in this field rather than this or a synchronized method.

Constructor Detail

Reader

protected Reader()
Create a new character-stream reader whose critical sections will synchronize on the reader itself.


Reader

protected Reader(Object lock)
Create a new character-stream reader whose critical sections will synchronize on the given object.

Parameters:
lock - The Object to synchronize on.
Method Detail

read

public int read()
         throws IOException
Read a single character. This method will block until a character is available, an I/O error occurs, or the end of the stream is reached.

Subclasses that intend to support efficient single-character input should override this method.

Returns:
The character read, as an integer in the range 0 to 65535 (0x00-0xffff), or -1 if the end of the stream has been reached
Throws:
IOException - If an I/O error occurs

read

public int read(char[] cbuf)
         throws IOException
Read characters into an array. This method will block until some input is available, an I/O error occurs, or the end of the stream is reached.

Parameters:
cbuf - Destination buffer
Returns:
The number of characters read, or -1 if the end of the stream has been reached
Throws:
IOException - If an I/O error occurs

read

public abstract int read(char[] cbuf,
                         int off,
                         int len)
                  throws IOException
Read characters into a portion of an array. This method will block until some input is available, an I/O error occurs, or the end of the stream is reached.

Parameters:
cbuf - Destination buffer
off - Offset at which to start storing characters
len - Maximum number of characters to read
Returns:
The number of characters read, or -1 if the end of the stream has been reached
Throws:
IOException - If an I/O error occurs

skip

public long skip(long n)
          throws IOException
Skip characters. This method will block until some characters are available, an I/O error occurs, or the end of the stream is reached.

Parameters:
n - The number of characters to skip
Returns:
The number of characters actually skipped
Throws:
IllegalArgumentException - If n is negative.
IOException - If an I/O error occurs

ready

public boolean ready()
              throws IOException
Tell whether this stream is ready to be read.

Returns:
True if the next read() is guaranteed not to block for input, false otherwise. Note that returning false does not guarantee that the next read will block.
Throws:
IOException - If an I/O error occurs

markSupported

public boolean markSupported()
Tell whether this stream supports the mark() operation. The default implementation always returns false. Subclasses should override this method.

Returns:
true if and only if this stream supports the mark operation.

mark

public void mark(int readAheadLimit)
          throws IOException
Mark the present position in the stream. Subsequent calls to reset() will attempt to reposition the stream to this point. Not all character-input streams support the mark() operation.

Parameters:
readAheadLimit - Limit on the number of characters that may be read while still preserving the mark. After reading this many characters, attempting to reset the stream may fail.
Throws:
IOException - If the stream does not support mark(), or if some other I/O error occurs

reset

public void reset()
           throws IOException
Reset the stream. If the stream has been marked, then attempt to reposition it at the mark. If the stream has not been marked, then attempt to reset it in some way appropriate to the particular stream, for example by repositioning it to its starting point. Not all character-input streams support the reset() operation, and some support reset() without supporting mark().

Throws:
IOException - If the stream has not been marked, or if the mark has been invalidated, or if the stream does not support reset(), or if some other I/O error occurs

close

public abstract void close()
                    throws IOException
Close the stream. Once a stream has been closed, further read(), ready(), mark(), or reset() invocations will throw an IOException. Closing a previously-closed stream, however, has no effect.

Throws:
IOException - If an I/O error occurs

JavaTM 2 Platform
Std. Ed. v1.4.1

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For further API reference and developer documentation, see Java 2 SDK SE Developer Documentation. That documentation contains more detailed, developer-targeted descriptions, with conceptual overviews, definitions of terms, workarounds, and working code examples.

Copyright 2002 Sun Microsystems, Inc. All rights reserved. Use is subject to license terms.