Create an Array populating it by .txt elements

Question

I want to create an array, populating it while reading elements from a .txt file formatted like so:

item1
item2
item3

So the final result has to be an array like this:

String[] myArray = {item1, item2, item3}

Thanks in advance.

Solution 1

1. Wrap a BufferedReader around a FileReader so that you can easily read every line of the file;
2. Store the lines in a List (assuming you don't know how many lines you are going to read);
3. Convert the List to an array using toArray.

Simple implementation:

public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
    List<String> lines = new ArrayList<String>();
    BufferedReader reader = null;
    try {
        reader = new BufferedReader(new FileReader("file.txt"));
        String line = null;
        while ((line = reader.readLine()) != null) {
            lines.add(line);
        }
    } finally {
        reader.close();
    }
    String[] array = lines.toArray();
}

Solution 2

This smells like homework. If it is you should re-read your notes, and tell us what you've tried.

Personally, I would use a Scanner (from java.util).

import java.io.*;
import java.util.*;

public class Franky {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Scanner sc = new Scanner(new File("myfile.txt"));
        String[] items = new String[3]; // use ArrayList if you don't know how many
        int i = 0;
        while(sc.hasNextLine() && i < items.length) {
            items[i] = sc.nextLine();
            i++;
        }
    }

}