File I/O Amanuensis

FileIO is a remarkable teaching tool for I/O programming which produces a set of Java source code samples to write or read the console, sequential file, random access file, string, byte array, character array, URL, HTTP CGI, Socket, resource or pipe. With FileIO, you can learn how to read or write various types instantly, including ASCII-8 bit characters (plain or locale-encoded), Unicode 16-bit characters, raw bytes, big endian binary, little endian binary, or serialized objects, buffered, unbuffered, or GZIP compressed.

You can deploy FileIO as a standalone application or as an applet that requires JDK 1.7+ compatible browser to run. The software also provides you with the source code and sample HTML, which you can use for any purpose other than military.

With FileIO, you only need to answer four multiple-choice questions about what you want to achieve. After selecting your choices in the dialog box, FileIO will generate corresponding code, which you can copy, paste, and edit. The questions are:

1) What is the type of the source/target?
- sequential file
- resource
- random access file
- String (in RAM i/o)
- char[] (in RAM i/o)
- byte[] (in RAM i/o)
- URL (remote i/o)
- HTTP CGI
- socket
- pipe

2) Do you want to read or write?
3) Which do you want: unbuffered, buffered, or compressed?
4) What is the format of the data being read or written?
- raw, untranslated, bulk, 8-bit bytes
- default-encoded chars (usually 8-bit)
- locale-encoded chars (usually 8-bit), e.g., IBM-OEM Cp437
- Unicode 16-bit chars
- big-endian binary (Java standard)
- little-endian binary (Intel standard)
- serialized objects

FileIO generates 617 distinct example programs, and you can use it online at mindprod.com/applet/fileio.html without the need to install it.