IOException and NullPointerException from ObjectInputStream - java

I'm writing a small program for an assignment and part of it involves reading from a file using ObjectInputStream. I've run into a brick wall because I keep getting errors when trying to close the file in the finally block as well as a NullPointerException but I cannot understand why. Any help is much appreciated! I have checked already and the file path is correct, so it is able to find the file.
Example file:
hello || apples, acai berry, bananas || shopping || 0.0005 || yes
public Disease[] readInCancers() {
Disease[] cancerList = null;
try {
FileInputStream fis = new FileInputStream(myData);
BufferedInputStream bis = new BufferedInputStream(fis);
ois = new ObjectInputStream(bis);
while(true) {
Disease disease = null;
try {
disease = (Disease)ois.readObject();
} catch (EOFException eofx) {
break;
}
if (cancerList == null || cancerList.length == 0) {
cancerList = new Disease[1];
cancerList[0] = disease;
} else {
Disease[] newList = new Disease[cancerList.length + 1];
System.arraycopy(cancerList, 0, newList, 0, cancerList.length);
newList[cancerList.length] = disease;
cancerList = newList;
}
}
} catch (FileNotFoundException fnfx) {
JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(null, "File could not be found");
} catch (IOException iox) {
JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(null, "Problem with reading from file");
} catch (ClassNotFoundException cnfx) {
JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(null, "Class could not be found");
} catch (NullPointerException npx) {
System.out.println("blah");
} finally {
try {
ois.close();
} catch (IOException iox) {
JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(null, "Problem with closing file");
}
}
return cancerList;
}
When I run the program, it gives a NullPointerException at ois.close() as well as an IOException that produces the pop-up "Problem with reading from file".
I have also tried changing how the file itself is structured, replaced the || (delimiters) with a word or even blank space but nothing changes.

Your FileInputStream is throwing an exception (I'm guessing from incorrect file permissions, but you'll have to look into this further); this occurs before you initialize your ObjectInputStream, so ois is still null when you reach your finally block which is resulting in a null pointer exception. It's usually a good idea to precede close statements in final blocks by null pointer checks for this reason.

When using an ObjectInputStream the input data is required to be in a byte format that can be read into a serialized object, Disease in this case. If the format is not in the expected format a StreamCorruptedException will be thrown. If you are changing the text file manually, chances are that this exception is being thrown but the exact message is not displayed as you are displaying a generic Problem with reading from file message.
Displaying the stack trace will help
iox.printStackTrace();
Ensure that you are writing the objects correctly to file. Alternatively you could use a text based file, and use Printwriter to write, Scanner to read. You can use || for as a Scanner delimiter.

Related

EOFException with ObjectInputStream

I have read other questions similar to this but didn't help much. So I have some serialized content in a file and I am trying to read it and print it on the console, content is getting printed fine but at the end, it's showing an EOFException. Is there any way to fix my code to avoid this exception?
try {
File file = new File("EnrolledStudentsSerial.txt");
FileInputStream fi = new FileInputStream(file);
ObjectInputStream input = new ObjectInputStream(fi);
while(true) {
System.out.println(input.readObject());
}
}
catch (IOException | ClassNotFoundException e) {
System.out.println("Error: " + e);
}
I don't think you want to 'avoid' this exception.
You need to know when you come to the end of the input, and the EOFException is what is telling you you've come to the end of the input.
Rather, you want to stop treating it as an error condition, since it is not an error, it is normal and expected.
try {
… code as before …
}
catch (EOFException e) {
// end of input, nothing to do here
}
catch (IOException | ClassNotFoundException e) {
System.out.println("Error: " + e);
}

JAVA objectinputstream cant drop out from the loop

Here is the code I have:
ObjectInputStream ois = null;
UserRegistration UR = new UserRegistration();
Scanner pause = new Scanner(System.in);
Admin go = new Admin();
try {
//ItemEntry book = new ItemEntry();
ois = new ObjectInputStream(new FileInputStream("Account.txt"));
while ((UR = (UserRegistration) ois.readObject()) != null) {
//if (book.getName().equals("1"))
{
System.out.println(UR);
}
}
} catch (EOFException e) {
System.out.println("\nEnd**");
}catch (ClassNotFoundException ex) {
System.out.println(ex.getMessage());
} catch (IOException e) {
System.out.println(e.getMessage());
} finally {
try {
ois.close();
System.out.println("Press \"ENTER\" to continue...");
pause.nextLine();
go.startup();
} catch (Exception ex) {
System.out.println(ex.getMessage());
}
}
}
How can I make it drop out from the loop and not to straight enter to the EOFException when it reach the last object? Help please !
This is a duplicate of this question :
Java FileInputStream ObjectInputStream reaches end of file EOF
Bottom line is that ObjectInputStream does not return null when it reaches the end of the stream. Instead, the underlying FileInputStream throws an EOFException. Although you could interpret that as the end of file, it does not allow you to distinguish a truncated file. So, practically speaking, ObjectInputStream expects you to know how many objects you will be reading in.
To get around this you could write an integer to the start of the file indicating how many UserRegistration objects are in the file. Read that value, then use a for loop to read that many objects.
Alternatively, you may be able to serialize your UserRegistration objects as an array or other container and then de-serialize the whole array/container.

EOFexception caused by empty file

I created a new file roomChecker which is empty. Now when I read it, it throws me an EOFException which is undesirable. Instead I want it to see that, if file is empty then it would run other two functions that are in if(roomFeed.size() == 0) condition. I could write this statement in EOFException catch clause; but that's not what I want to do because then every time when the file will be read and reaches end of file it will execute those functions. Instead when the file has some data it should do what is specified in else.
File fileChecker = new File("roomChecker.ser");
if(!fileChecker.exists()) {
try {
fileChecker.createNewFile();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
System.out.println("Unable to create new File");
}
}
try(FileInputStream fis = new FileInputStream("roomChecker.ser"); ObjectInputStream ois = new ObjectInputStream(fis)) {
roomFeed = (List<roomChecker>) ois.readObject();
System.out.println("End of read");
if(roomFeed.size() == 0) {
System.out.println("your in null if statement");
defaultRoomList();
uploadAvailableRooms();
} else {
for(int i=0; i<roomNumber.size(); i++) {
for(int j=0; j<roomFeed.size(); i++) {
if((roomNumber.get(i)).equals(roomFeed.get(i).getRoomNumSearch())){
System.out.println("Reach Dead End for now");
} else {
defaultRoomList();
uploadAvailableRooms();
}
}
}
}
} catch (IOException ioe) {
ioe.printStackTrace();
} catch (ClassNotFoundException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
All this:
if(!fileChecker.exists()) {
try {
fileChecker.createNewFile();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
System.out.println("Unable to create new File");
}
}
is a complete waste of time, and it is one of two possible causes for your empty file problem. Creating a file just so you can open it and then get a different problem instead of coping correctly with the original problem of the file not being there isn't a rational strategy. Instead, you should do this:
if (fileChecker.isFile() && fileChecker.length() == 0) {
// file is zero length: bail out
}
and, in the following code, this:
try(FileInputStream fis = new FileInputStream(fileChecker); ObjectInputStream ois = new ObjectInputStream(fis)) {
// ...
}
catch (FileNotFoundException exc) {
// no such file ...
}
// other catch blocks as before.
Of course you can still get EOFException if you read the file to its end, or if the file is incomplete, and you still need to handle that.

An EOFException in Java

I am currently doing serialization in JAVA, As of now I have gotten the serializing and de-serializing working correctly. eg If I make a film in the program, close the program and then reopen the program the film will still be there. My problem is, even though all the code works and the serializing works correctly when I run the program I get this error as seen below.
Here you can see my program running and it showing the exception
Here is the code where the exception is pointing to
public void readRecordsFromFile()
{
Video v = null;
try
{
FileInputStream fileIn = new FileInputStream("PrintOut.dat");
ObjectInputStream in = new ObjectInputStream(fileIn);
while((v = (Video)in.readObject()) != null)
{
videos.add(v);
}
//videos=(ArrayList<Video>)in.readObject();
fileIn.close();
in.close();
}
catch(IOException i)
{
System.out.println("IO Exception");
i.printStackTrace();
return;
}
catch(ClassNotFoundException m)
{
System.out.println("Class Not Found Exception");
m.printStackTrace();
return;
}
}
And in particular it points to the line
while((v = (Video)in.readObject()) !=null)
Is there a way to remove the exception? The fact that my program runs fine even with the exception makes me believe that it maybe isn't that important but I feel it would be good practice to remove the exception.
Any help would be appreciated and if any of the other code is required just let me know,
Thanks in advance,
Jason
There's no really clean way to work out when the ObjectInputStream is going to hit the buffers.
Your best strategy is to start by writing an integer at the beginning to say how many objects you're going to write. Then, when you read objects back, you start by reading this integer in; then you read that many objects from the stream.
EOFException means you hit the end of the file and there's nothing to really deal with that. What I would recommend is adding a new catch for the EOFException to keep the error from showing up in your console. I would also move the close() calls to a finally block - so something like this:
public void readRecordsFromFile()
{
Video v = null;
try
{
FileInputStream fileIn = new FileInputStream("PrintOut.dat");
ObjectInputStream in = new ObjectInputStream(fileIn);
while((v = (Video)in.readObject()) != null)
{
videos.add(v);
}
//videos=(ArrayList<Video>)in.readObject();
}
catch(IOException i)
{
System.out.println("IO Exception");
i.printStackTrace();
return;
}
catch(ClassNotFoundException m)
{
System.out.println("Class Not Found Exception");
m.printStackTrace();
return;
}
catch(EOFException eofe)
{
// Don't print anything, we just don't want the error blowing up in the regular output.
return;
}
finally
{
// Guarantee that the streams are closed, even if there's an error.
fileIn.close();
in.close();
}
}

Stream Object Initialization

Now I am getting compile time error at line 30 and 38 that 'fin' might not have been initialized. but its perfectly to write it this way
import java.io.*;
class CopyFile {
public static void main(String args[]) throws IOException {
int i;
FileInputStream fin;//can't it be done like this?
FileOutputStream fout= new FileOutputStream(args[1]);
try{
//open input file
try{
fin = new FileInputStream(args[0]);
}
catch(FileNotFoundException e){
System.out.println("Input file Not Found");
return;
}
//open output file
try{
fout = new FileOutputStream(args[1]);
}
catch(FileNotFoundException e){
System.out.println("Error Opening File");
}
}
catch(ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException e){
System.out.println("usage: Copyfile From to");
}
try{
do{
i = fin.read();
if(i!= -1)
fout.write(i);
}while(i != -1);
}
catch(IOException e){
System.out.println("file error");
}
fin.close();
fout.close();
}
}
I have seen it many time initialized like this. I think its due to the try blocks.
it might miss the initialization due to being in the try block and hence the error?
The problem is that you're not initializing the FileInputStream fin at all. Your code will look like this to the compiler:
FileInputStream fin;
try {
fin = ...
//more code goes here...
} catch (...) {
//exception handling...
} finally {
fin.close(); //fin is not even null for the compiler
}
In order to make the code work, initialize it at least with a null value and check if fin != null before using the close method.
FileInputStream fin = null;
try {
fin = ...
//more code goes here...
} catch (...) {
//exception handling...
} finally {
if (fin != null) {
fin.close(); //fin is not null, at least the JVM could close it
}
}
More info:
Java: Declaring Variables
Uninitialized variables and members in Java
FileInputStream fin=null;
Assign it null or FileInputStream object.
Local variable need to be assigned to some value before being used.
Though in the first try block, you are initializing fin as fin = new FileInputStream(args[0]);, your nested statements confuse the compiler. Just update your declaration as below:
FileInputStream fin = null;
Dont use try catch for an if and vice versa.
Try/catch is for when things go wrong behind your control and that is no part of normal program flow for example writing to a hard disk that is full....
Use if for normal error checking
In your example check your args array with an if block and then initialize your fin.

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