Develop Reference

sorting files using multithreading in java

I was given an assignment to write all ordered contents of given files into a result.txt. At first, the filenames are split into different Arraylists where each file contains a label in a format #n/N where N is the total number of files. e.g.
British explorer James Clark Ross led the first
expedition to reach the north magnetic pole
#001/004
from a file 1831-06-01.txt
The problem with my code is that it has written in order 1,4,2,3 respectively. However, the result must be in order 1,2,3,4. This may be due to a lack of synchronization. Nonetheless, I am still struggling to fix the problem.
This is my code:
import java.io.BufferedReader;
import java.io.BufferedWriter;
import java.io.File;
import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
import java.io.FileReader;
import java.io.FileWriter;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.util.*;
class PopThread implements Runnable {
ArrayList<String> fileList;
public PopThread(ArrayList<String> fileList) {
this.fileList = fileList;
}
#Override
public void run() {
//System.out.println("running\n");
Thread.currentThread().setPriority(Thread.MIN_PRIORITY);
long startTime = System.nanoTime();
System.out.println("fileList: " + fileList);
ArrayList<String> sortedFileList = sortFiles(fileList);
File resultFile = new File("result.txt");
for (String filename : sortedFileList) {
Writer w1 = new Writer(filename, resultFile);
Thread t = new Thread(w1);
t.setPriority(Thread.MAX_PRIORITY);
t.start();
}
long stopTime = System.nanoTime();
//System.out.println("Total execution time: " + (stopTime - startTime));
}
public ArrayList<String> readFiles(String filename) {
ArrayList<String> list = new ArrayList<String>();
try {
File myObj = new File(filename);
Scanner s = new Scanner(myObj);
while (s.hasNext()) {
list.add(s.next());
}
s.close();
} catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
return list;
}
public int getNumber(String filename) {
String lastLine = "";
String sCurrentLine;
int identifier_integer = -1;
try {
BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(filename));
while ((sCurrentLine = br.readLine()) != null) {
lastLine = sCurrentLine;
}
String identifier_number = lastLine.substring(1,4);
identifier_integer = Integer.parseInt(identifier_number);
} catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
return identifier_integer;
}
public ArrayList<String> sortFiles(ArrayList<String> listFileName) {
int i = listFileName.size();
boolean sorted = false;
while ( (i > 1) && (!(sorted)) ) {
sorted = true;
for (int j = 1; j < i; j++) {
if ( getNumber(listFileName.get(j-1)) > getNumber(listFileName.get(j)) ) {
String temp = listFileName.get(j-1);
listFileName.set(j-1, listFileName.get(j));
listFileName.set(j, temp);
sorted = false;
}
}
i--;
}
return listFileName;
}
}
class Writer implements Runnable {
String filename;
File resultFile;
public Writer(String filename, File resultFile) {
this.filename = filename;
this.resultFile = resultFile;
}
#Override
public void run() {
String content;
content = readFromFile(filename);
writeToFile(resultFile, content);
}
private static void writeToFile(File resultFile, String content) {
try {
BufferedWriter writer = new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter(resultFile, true));
writer.write(content);
//writer.write("file content written");
writer.flush();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
static String readFromFile(String filename) {
StringBuffer content = new StringBuffer();
try {
String text;
BufferedReader reader = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(filename));
while ((text = reader.readLine()) != null) {
content.append(text);
content.append("\n");
}
} catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
return content.toString();
}
}
public class q4 {
public static void main(String[] args) {
ArrayList<String> filesOne = new ArrayList<String>();
filesOne.add("1831-06-01.txt");
filesOne.add("2003-08-27.txt");
ArrayList<String> filesTwo = new ArrayList<String>();
filesTwo.add("1961-04-12.txt");
filesTwo.add("1972-12-11.txt");
PopThread popRunnableOne = new PopThread(filesOne);
PopThread popRunnableTwo = new PopThread(filesTwo);
Thread threadOne = new Thread(popRunnableOne);
Thread threadTwo = new Thread(popRunnableTwo);
threadOne.start();
threadTwo.start();
try {
threadOne.join();
threadTwo.join();
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
( NOTE: The class q4 cannot be altered)

This assignment is horrible. You have my sympathy.
Your two threads will have to communicate with each other. Each thread will have to know, what is the filename that the other thread wants to output next. And, they will have to take turns. Each thread needs to loop:
While the date on my next file is less than or equal to the date on the other thread's next file, output my next file,
Tell the other thread, "it's your turn,"
If I have no more files, then exit (return from the run() method), otherwise, wait for the other thread to tell me it's my turn again,
Go back to step 1.
Having to take turns is the worst part of the assignment. Any time you find yourself needing to make threads take turns doing something—any time you need to make threads do things in a particular order—that's a clear sign that all of the things should be done by a single thread.
The only way threads can communicate is through shared variables. Your instructor has done you a huge disservice by telling you not to modify the q4 class. That prevents you from passing any shared objects in to your PopThread implementation through its constructor.
The only other way your two threads can share any variables is by making the variables static. Forcing you to use static is the second worst part of the assignment. If you go on to study software engineering, you will learn that static is an anti-pattern. Programs that use static variables are brittle (i.e., hard to modify), and they are hard to test.
Forcing you to use static variables also will make your threads do extra work to figure out who is who. Normally, I would do something like this so that each thread would automatically know which state is its own, and which belongs to the other guy:
class SharedState { ... }
class PopThread {
public PopThread(
SharedState myState,
SharedState otherThreadState,
ArrayList<String> fileList
) {
this.myState = myState;
this.otherGuyState = otherThreadState;
this.fileList = fileList;
...initialize this.myState...
}
...
}
class q4 {
public static void main(String[] args) {
SharedState stateOne = new SharedState();
SharedState stateTwo = new SharedState();
PopThread popRunnableOne = new PopThread(stateOne, stateTwo, filesOne);
PopThread popRunnableTwo = new PopThread(stateTwo, stateOne, filesTwo);
...
}
}
The best way I can think of with static variables would be to have an array of two SharedState, and have the threads use an AtomicInteger to each assign themself one of the two array slots:
class PopThread {
static SharedState[] state = new SharedState [2];
static AtomicInteger nextStateIndex = new AtomicInteger(0);
public PopThread(
SharedState myState,
SharedState otherThreadState,
ArrayList<String> fileList
) {
myStateIndex = nextStateIndex.getAndIncrement();
otherGuysStateIndex = myStateIndex ^ 1;
this.fileList = fileList;
...initialize state[myStateIndex]...
}
...
}

How to store an ArrayList in a file?

I have a class which represents an ArrayList stored in a file, because I need an ArrayList with multiple gigabytes of data in it which is obviously too large to be stored in memory. The data is represented by a class called Field and the function Field.parse() is just for converting the Field into a String and the other way.
The Field class stores a list of (strange) chess pieces and their coordinates.
My class is working fine, but it takes a long time to add an element to the file and I need my program to run as fast as possible. Does anyone know a more efficient/faster way of doing things?
Also, I am not allowed to use external libraries/apis. Please keep that in mind.
This is the class which is responsible for storing Field objects in a temp file:
private File file;
private BufferedReader reader;
private BufferedWriter writer;
public FieldSaver() {
try {
file = File.createTempFile("chess-moves-", ".temp");
System.out.println(file.getAbsolutePath());
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
public void add(Field field) {
try {
File temp = File.createTempFile("chess-moves-", ".temp");
writer = new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter(temp));
reader = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(file));
String line;
while((line = reader.readLine()) != null ) {
writer.write(line);
writer.newLine();
}
reader.close();
writer.write(field.parse());
writer.close();
file.delete();
file = new File(temp.getAbsolutePath());
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
public Field get(int n) {
try {
reader = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(file));
for (int i = 0; i < n; i++) {
reader.readLine();
}
String line = reader.readLine();
reader.close();
return Field.parse(line);
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
return null;
}
And this is the Field class:
private WildBoar wildBoar;
private HuntingDog[] huntingDogs;
private Hunter hunter;
private int size;
#Override
public String toString() {
String result = "Wildschwein: " + wildBoar.toString();
for (HuntingDog dog : huntingDogs) {
result += "; Hund: " + dog.toString();
}
return result + "; Jäger: " + hunter.toString();
}
#Override
public boolean equals(Object obj) {
if (obj instanceof Field) {
Field field = (Field) obj;
HuntingDog[] dogs = field.getHuntingDogs();
return wildBoar.equals(field.getWildBoar()) && hunter.equals(field.getHunter()) && huntingDogs[0].equals(dogs[0]) && huntingDogs[1].equals(dogs[1]) && huntingDogs[2].equals(dogs[2]);
}
return false;
}
public Field(int size, WildBoar wildBoar, HuntingDog[] huntingDogs, Hunter hunter) {
this.size = size;
this.wildBoar = wildBoar;
this.huntingDogs = huntingDogs;
this.hunter = hunter;
}
public WildBoar getWildBoar() {
return wildBoar;
}
public HuntingDog[] getHuntingDogs() {
return huntingDogs;
}
public Hunter getHunter() {
return hunter;
}
public int getSize() {
return size;
}
public static Field parse(String s) {
String[] arr = s.split(",");
WildBoar boar = WildBoar.parse(arr[0]);
Hunter hunter = Hunter.parse(arr[1]);
HuntingDog[] dogs = new HuntingDog[arr.length - 2];
for(int i = 2; i < arr.length; i++) {
dogs[i - 2] = HuntingDog.parse(arr[i]);
}
return new Field(8, boar, dogs, hunter);
}
public String parse() {
String result = wildBoar.parse() + "," + hunter.parse();
for(HuntingDog dog : huntingDogs) {
result += "," + dog.parse();
}
return result;
}

Here's an MCVE to do what you want, based on the information you provided.
You can run it and see that it can save a Field to the file and get a Field by index very quickly.
The Fields are constant length, so you can get a Field by index by going to byte offset of index times field length in bytes. This would be significantly more difficult if the field were not constant length.
import java.io.Closeable;
import java.io.DataInput;
import java.io.DataOutput;
import java.io.File;
import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.RandomAccessFile;
public class FieldSaver implements Closeable {
public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
File f = File.createTempFile("chess-moves-", ".temp");
try (FieldSaver test = new FieldSaver(f);) {
for (byte i = 0; i < 100; i++) {
test.add(new Field(8, new WildBoar(i, i), new Hunter(i, i), new HuntingDog[] {
new HuntingDog(i, i),
new HuntingDog(i, i),
new HuntingDog(i, i) }));
}
// Get a few Fields by index
System.out.println(test.get(0));
System.out.println(test.get(50));
System.out.println(test.get(99));
// EOF exception, there is no Field 100
// System.out.println(test.get(100));
}
}
private final RandomAccessFile data;
public FieldSaver(File f) throws FileNotFoundException {
data = new RandomAccessFile(f, "rw");
}
public void add(Field field) throws IOException {
data.seek(data.length());
field.write(data);
}
public Field get(int index) throws IOException {
data.seek(index * Field.STORAGE_LENGTH_BYTES);
return Field.read(data);
}
public void close() throws IOException { data.close(); }
static abstract class Piece {
protected byte xPos;
protected byte yPos;
public Piece(DataInput data) throws IOException {
xPos = data.readByte();
yPos = data.readByte();
}
public Piece(byte xPos, byte yPos) {
this.xPos = xPos;
this.yPos = yPos;
}
public void write(DataOutput data) throws IOException {
data.writeByte(xPos);
data.writeByte(yPos);
}
public String toString() { return "[" + xPos + ", " + yPos + "]"; }
}
static class Hunter extends Piece {
public Hunter(byte xPos, byte yPos) { super(xPos, yPos); }
public Hunter(DataInput data) throws IOException { super(data); }
}
static class HuntingDog extends Piece {
public HuntingDog(byte xPos, byte yPos) { super(xPos, yPos); }
public HuntingDog(DataInput data) throws IOException { super(data); }
}
static class WildBoar extends Piece {
public WildBoar(byte xPos, byte yPos) { super(xPos, yPos); }
public WildBoar(DataInput data) throws IOException { super(data); }
}
static class Field {
// size of boar + hunter + 3 dogs
public static final int STORAGE_LENGTH_BYTES = 2 + 2 + (3 * 2);
private int size;
private WildBoar boar;
private Hunter hunter;
private final HuntingDog[] dogs;
public Field(int size, WildBoar wildBoar, Hunter hunter, HuntingDog[] huntingDogs) {
this.size = size;
this.boar = wildBoar;
this.hunter = hunter;
this.dogs = huntingDogs;
}
public String toString() {
String result = "Wildschwein: " + boar.toString();
for (HuntingDog dog : dogs) {
result += "; Hund: " + dog.toString();
}
return result + "; Jäger: " + hunter.toString();
}
public static Field read(DataInput data) throws IOException {
WildBoar boar = new WildBoar(data);
Hunter hunter = new Hunter(data);
HuntingDog[] dogs = new HuntingDog[3];
for (int i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
dogs[i] = new HuntingDog(data);
}
return new Field(8, boar, hunter, dogs);
}
public void write(DataOutput data) throws IOException {
boar.write(data);
hunter.write(data);
for (HuntingDog dog : dogs) {
dog.write(data);
}
}
}
}

Use a Map implementation like Cache from ehcache. This library will optimize for you so you don't have to handle writing and reading to disk and manage when to keep it in memory or on disk. You can just use it as a normal map. You probably want a map instead of a list for faster lookup so the library can optimize even more for you.
http://www.ehcache.org/
CacheManager cacheManager = CacheManagerBuilder.newCacheManagerBuilder()
.withCache("preConfigured",
CacheConfigurationBuilder.newCacheConfigurationBuilder(Long.class, String.class,
ResourcePoolsBuilder.heap(100))
.build())
.build(true);
Cache<Long, String> preConfigured
= cacheManager.getCache("preConfigured", Long.class, String.class);

Unexpected query result inside each executorservice thread

I am pulling data in batches (chunkSize=1000) for that I have implemented executor Service. In the below loop I am calculating the firstResult and sending to executorService to fetch data and insert into mongodb
for(int i = 1; i <= numOfBatches; i++){
int firstResult = (i -1) * chunkSize;
explicitAudienceCreationExecutorService.fetchFromMartAndInsertIntoMongo(firstResult,chunkSize,query,promotion,
filterKeywords,audienceFilterName,programId,counttoReturn.get(0).intValue());
}
This is my runnable task which is giving unexpected result while executing query
For ex: when I am executing the code without any loop and directly pass firstResult as 302000 it prints in log
firstResult 302000 queryResultSize 1000
But when I do this in loop I saw this in logs. This happens for several values.
firstResult 302000 queryResultSize 899
package com.loylty.campaign.com.loylty.campaign.service;
import javax.persistence.TypedQuery;
import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.Date;
import java.util.HashMap;
import java.util.List;
import static com.loylty.campaign.com.loylty.campaign.config.MongoTenantTemplate.tenantTemplates;
#Service
public class ExplicitAudienceCreationExecutorService {
static int classCount = 0;
#Autowired
CampaignExecutorService campaignExecutorService;
#Autowired
MongoTemplate mongoTemplate;
#Autowired
AudienceWithCriteria audienceWithCriteria;
private final Logger logger = LoggerFactory.getLogger(this.getClass());
public void fetchFromMartAndInsertIntoMongo(int fr, int cs, TypedQuery<Object[]> qr, Promotion promotion,
FilterKeywords filterKeywords, String audienceFilterName, String programId, int queryrernCont) {
final int firstResult = fr;
final int chunkSize = cs;
final TypedQuery<Object[]> query = qr;
campaignExecutorService.dotask(new Runnable() {
#Override
public void run() {
mongoTemplate = tenantTemplates.get(programId);
final List<Object[]> toReturn = query.setFirstResult(firstResult).setMaxResults(chunkSize).getResultList();
classCount++;
System.out.println("classCount "+ classCount);
logger.info("firstResult "+ firstResult + " queryResultSize " + toReturn.size() );
if (toReturn != null || toReturn.size() > 0) {
List<TGAudience> tgAudienceList = new ArrayList<>();
for (Object[] tuple : toReturn) {
HashMap<String, Object> queryResponseTuple = new HashMap<>();
int index = 0;
for (RequiredKeys selectProperty : promotion.getRequiredKeys()) {
queryResponseTuple.put(filterKeywords.matcher(selectProperty.getKeyName()).iterator().next(), tuple[index++]);
}
if (null != promotion.getAggregation() && promotion.getAggregation().size() > 0) {
for (Aggregation aggregations : promotion.getAggregation()) {
queryResponseTuple.put(filterKeywords.matcher(aggregations.getAggregateOn()).iterator().next() + "_" + aggregations.getAggregateStrategy().name(), tuple[index++]);
}
}
TGAudience tgAudience1 = new TGAudience();
String stringToConvert = String.valueOf(queryResponseTuple.get("CUSTOMER_MOBILE"));
tgAudience1.setMobile(stringToConvert);
tgAudience1.setCustomerId(String.valueOf(queryResponseTuple.get("CUSTOMER_CUSTOMER_ID")));
tgAudienceList.add(tgAudience1);
}
System.out.println("tgAudienceList "+ tgAudienceList.size());
mongoTemplate.insert(tgAudienceList, audienceFilterName);
}
try {
Thread.sleep(50);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
);
}
}
CampaignExecutorService
package com.loylty.campaign.com.loylty.campaign.service;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Service;
import java.util.concurrent.*;
#Service
public class CampaignExecutorService {
private ExecutorService executorService = Executors.newFixedThreadPool(100);
public void dotask(Runnable runnable){
executorService.submit(runnable);
}
}

Wait in ForkJoin Pool ( Java )

I am using Fork join pool in java for multitasking. Now i came across a situation where, for every task, I need to hit a url then wait for 10 minutes and then again hit another url to read the data. Now the problem is that for those 10 minutes my CPU is idle and not starting another tasks ( more than those defined in fork join pool).
static ForkJoinPool pool = new ForkJoinPool(10);
public static void main(String[] args){
List<String> list = new ArrayList<>();
for(int i=1; i<=100; i++){
list.add("Str"+i);
}
final Tasker task = new Tasker(list);
pool.invoke(task);
public class Tasker extends RecursiveAction{
private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
List<String> myList;
public Tasker(List<String> checkersList) {
super();
this.myList = checkersList;
}
#Override
protected void compute() {
if(myList.size()==1){
System.out.println(myList.get(0) + "start");
//Date start = new Date();
try {
Thread.sleep(10*60*1000);
} catch (Exception e) {
// TODO Auto-generated catch block
e.printStackTrace();
}
System.out.println(myList.get(0) + "Finished");
}
else{
List<String> temp = new ArrayList<>();
temp.add( myList.get( myList.size()-1 ) );
myList.remove( myList.size()-1 );
Tasker left = new Tasker(myList);
Tasker right = new Tasker(temp);
left.fork();
right.compute();
left.join();
}
}
Now What should I do so that CPU picks all the tasks and then wait parallaly for them.

Unfortunately, ForkJoinPool does not work well in the face of Thread.sleep(), because it designed for many short tasks that finish quickly, rather than tasks that block for a long time.
Instead, for what you are trying to accomplish, I would recommend using ScheduledThreadPoolExecutor and dividing your task into two parts.
import java.util.*;
import java.util.concurrent.*;
public class Main {
static ScheduledThreadPoolExecutor pool = new ScheduledThreadPoolExecutor(10);
public static void main(String[] args){
for(int i=1; i<=100; i++){
pool.schedule(new FirstHalf("Str"+i), 0, TimeUnit.NANOSECONDS);
}
}
static class FirstHalf implements Runnable {
String name;
public FirstHalf(String name) {
this.name = name;
}
public void run() {
System.out.println(name + "start");
pool.schedule(new SecondHalf(name), 10, TimeUnit.MINUTES);
}
}
static class SecondHalf implements Runnable {
String name;
public SecondHalf(String name) {
this.name = name;
}
public void run() {
System.out.println(name + "Finished");
}
}
}
If Java provides a thread pool which allows releasing the underlying resources (that is, the kernel thread participating in the thread pool) during a Thread.sleep(), you should use that instead, but I currently do not know of one.

According to docs forkJoin basic use section tells:
if (my portion of the work is small enough)
do the work directly
else
split my work into two pieces
invoke the two pieces and wait for the results
Hopefully this meets your need if you are using forkjoin
public class Tasker extends RecursiveAction {
static ForkJoinPool pool = new ForkJoinPool(10);
static int threshold = 10;
public static void main(String[] args){
List<String> list = new ArrayList<>();
for(int i=1; i<=100; i++){
list.add("Str"+i);
}
final Tasker task = new Tasker(list);
pool.invoke(task);
}
private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
List<String> myList;
public Tasker(List<String> checkersList) {
super();
this.myList = checkersList;
}
void computeDirectly() {
for(String url : myList){
System.out.println(url + " start");
}
//Date start = new Date();
try {
//keep hitting url
while (true) {
for(String url : myList) {
//url hitting code here
System.out.println(url + " hitting");
}
Thread.sleep(10 * 60 * 1000);
}
} catch (Exception e) {
// TODO Auto-generated catch block
e.printStackTrace();
}
for(String url : myList){
System.out.println(url + " Finished");
}
}
#Override
protected void compute() {
if (myList.size() <= threshold) {
computeDirectly();
return;
}
//temp list have only one url
//List<String> temp = new ArrayList<>();
//temp.add( myList.get( myList.size()-1 ) );
//myList.remove( myList.size()-1 );
//Tasker left = new Tasker(myList);
//Tasker right = new Tasker(temp);
//left.fork();
//right.compute();
//left.join();
List<String> first = new ArrayList<>();
List<String> second = new ArrayList<>();
//divide list
int len = myList.size();
int smHalf = len / 2;//smaller half
first = myList.subList(0, smHalf);
second = myList.subList(smHalf + 1, len);
invokeAll(new Tasker(first), new Tasker(second));
}
}

Sorting lines in a file by 2 fields with JAVA

I work at a printing company that has many programs in COBOL and I have been tasked to
convert the COBOL programs into JAVA programs. I've run into a snag in the one conversion. I need to take a file that each line is a record and on each line the data is blocked.
Example of a line is
60000003448595072410013 FFFFFFFFFFV 80 0001438001000014530020120808060134
I need to sort data by a 5 digit number at the 19-23 characters and then by the very first character on a line.
BufferedReader input;
BufferedWriter output;
String[] sort, sorted, style, accountNumber, customerNumber;
String holder;
int lineCount;
int lineCounter() {
int result = 0;
boolean eof = false;
try {
FileReader inputFile = new FileReader("C:\\Users\\cbook\\Desktop\\Chemical\\"
+ "LB26529.fil");
input = new BufferedReader(inputFile);
while (!eof) {
holder = input.readLine();
if (holder == null) {
eof = true;
} else {
result++;
}
}
} catch (IOException e) {
System.out.println("Error - " + e.toString());
}
return result;
}
chemSort(){
lineCount = this.lineCounter();
sort = new String[lineCount];
sorted = new String[lineCount];
style = new String[lineCount];
accountNumber = new String[lineCount];
customerNumber = new String[lineCount];
try {
FileReader inputFile = new FileReader("C:\\Users\\cbook\\Desktop\\Chemical\\"
+ "LB26529.fil");
input = new BufferedReader(inputFile);
for (int i = 0; i < (lineCount + 1); i++) {
holder = input.readLine();
if (holder != null) {
sort[i] = holder;
style[i] = sort[i].substring(0, 1);
customerNumber[i] = sort[i].substring(252, 257);
}
}
} catch (IOException e) {
System.out.println("Error - " + e.toString());
}
}
This what I have so far and I'm not really sure where to go from here or even if this is the correct way
to go about sorting the file. After the file is sorted it will be stored into another file and processed
again with another program for it to be ready for printing.

List<String> linesAsList = new ArrayList<String>();
String line=null;
while(null!=(line=reader.readLine())) linesAsList.add(line);
Collections.sort(linesAsList, new Comparator<String>() {
public int compare(String o1,String o2){
return (o1.substring(18,23)+o1.substring(0,1)).compareTo(o2.substring(18,23)+o2.substring(0,1));
}});
for (String line:linesAsList) System.out.println(line); // or whatever output stream you want
This phone's autocorrect is messing up my answer

Read the file into an ArrayList (instead of an array). Use the following methods:
// to declare the arraylist
ArrayList<String> lines = new ArrayList<String>();
// to add a new line to it (within your reading-lines loop)
lines.add(input.readLine());
Then, sort it using a custom Comparator:
Collections.sort(lines, new Comparator<String>() {
public int compare(String a, String b) {
String a5 = theFiveNumbersOf(a);
String b5 = theFiveNumbersOf(b);
int firstComparison = a5.compareTo(b5);
if (firstComparison != 0) { return firstComparison; }
String a1 = theDigitOf(a);
String b1 = theDigitOf(b);
return a1.compareTo(b1);
}
});
(It is unclear what 5 digits or what digit you want to compare; I've left them as functions for you to fill in).
Finally, write it to the output file:
BufferedWriter ow = new BufferedWriter(new FileOutputStream("filename.extension"));
for (String line : lines) {
ow.println(line);
}
ow.close();
(adding imports and try/catch as needed)

This code will sort a file based on mainframe sort parameters.
You pass 3 parameters to the main method of the Sort class.
The input file path.
The output file path.
The sort parameters in mainframe sort format. In your case, this string would be 19,5,CH,A,1,1,CH,A
This first class, the SortParameter class, holds instances of the sort parameters. There's one instance for every group of 4 parameters in the sort parameters string. This class is a basic getter / setter class, except for the getDifference method. The getDifference method brings some of the sort comparator code into the SortParameter class to simplify the comparator code in the Sort class.
public class SortParameter {
protected int fieldStartByte;
protected int fieldLength;
protected String fieldType;
protected String sortDirection;
public SortParameter(int fieldStartByte, int fieldLength, String fieldType,
String sortDirection) {
this.fieldStartByte = fieldStartByte;
this.fieldLength = fieldLength;
this.fieldType = fieldType;
this.sortDirection = sortDirection;
}
public int getFieldStartPosition() {
return fieldStartByte - 1;
}
public int getFieldEndPosition() {
return getFieldStartPosition() + fieldLength;
}
public String getFieldType() {
return fieldType;
}
public String getSortDirection() {
return sortDirection;
}
public int getDifference(String a, String b) {
int difference = 0;
if (getFieldType().equals("CH")) {
String as = a.substring(getFieldStartPosition(),
getFieldEndPosition());
String bs = b.substring(getFieldStartPosition(),
getFieldEndPosition());
difference = as.compareTo(bs);
if (getSortDirection().equals("D")) {
difference = -difference;
}
}
return difference;
}
}
The Sort class contains the code to read the input file, sort the input file, and write the output file. This class could probably use some more error checking.
import java.io.BufferedReader;
import java.io.BufferedWriter;
import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
import java.io.FileReader;
import java.io.FileWriter;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.Collections;
import java.util.Comparator;
import java.util.List;
public class Sort implements Runnable {
protected List<String> lines;
protected String inputFilePath;
protected String outputFilePath;
protected String sortParameters;
public Sort(String inputFilePath, String outputFilePath,
String sortParameters) {
this.inputFilePath = inputFilePath;
this.outputFilePath = outputFilePath;
this.sortParameters = sortParameters;
}
#Override
public void run() {
List<SortParameter> parameters = parseParameters(sortParameters);
lines = read(inputFilePath);
lines = sort(lines, parameters);
write(outputFilePath, lines);
}
protected List<SortParameter> parseParameters(String sortParameters) {
List<SortParameter> parameters = new ArrayList<SortParameter>();
String[] field = sortParameters.split(",");
for (int i = 0; i < field.length; i += 4) {
SortParameter parameter = new SortParameter(
Integer.parseInt(field[i]), Integer.parseInt(field[i + 1]),
field[i + 2], field[i + 3]);
parameters.add(parameter);
}
return parameters;
}
protected List<String> sort(List<String> lines,
final List<SortParameter> parameters) {
Collections.sort(lines, new Comparator<String>() {
#Override
public int compare(String a, String b) {
for (SortParameter parameter : parameters) {
int difference = parameter.getDifference(a, b);
if (difference != 0) {
return difference;
}
}
return 0;
}
});
return lines;
}
protected List<String> read(String filePath) {
List<String> lines = new ArrayList<String>();
BufferedReader reader = null;
try {
String line;
reader = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(filePath));
while ((line = reader.readLine()) != null) {
lines.add(line);
}
} catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
} finally {
try {
if (reader != null) {
reader.close();
}
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
return lines;
}
protected void write(String filePath, List<String> lines) {
BufferedWriter writer = null;
try {
writer = new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter(filePath));
for (String line : lines) {
writer.write(line);
writer.newLine();
}
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
} finally {
try {
if (writer != null) {
writer.flush();
writer.close();
}
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
public static void main(String[] args) {
if (args.length < 3) {
System.err.println("The sort process requires 3 parameters.");
System.err.println(" 1. The input file path.");
System.err.println(" 2. The output file path.");
System.err.print (" 3. The sort parameters in mainframe ");
System.err.println("sort format. Example: 15,5,CH,A");
} else {
new Sort(args[0], args[1], args[2]).run();
}
}
}