[java] How to check if a character in a string is a digit or letter

I have the user entering a single character into the program and it is stored as a string. I would like to know how I could check to see if the character that was entered is a letter or a digit. I have an if statement, so if its a letter its prints that it's a letter, and the same for a digit. The code I have so far doesn't work but I feel like I'm close. Any help you can offer is appreciated.

  System.out.println("Please enter a single character: ");
  String character = in.next();

  System.out.println(character);

  if (character.isLetter()){
    System.out.println("The character entered is a letter.");
  }
  else (character.isDigit()){
    Syste.out.println("The character entered is a digit.");

I have coded a sample program that checks if a string contains a number in it! I guess it will serve for this purpose as well.

public class test {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        String c;
        boolean b;

        System.out.println("Enter the value");
        Scanner s = new Scanner(System.in);
        c = s.next();
        b = containsNumber(c);
        try {
            if (b == true) {
                throw new CharacterFormatException();
            } else {
                System.out.println("Valid String \t" + c);
            }
        } catch (CharacterFormatException ex) {
            System.out.println("Exception Raised-Contains Number");

        }
    }

    static boolean containsNumber(String c) {
        char[] ch = new char[10];
        ch = c.toCharArray();

        for (int i = 0; i < ch.length; i++) {
            if ((ch[i] >= 48) && (ch[i] <= 57)) {
                return true;
            }
        }
        return false;
    }
}

CharacterFormatException is a user defined Exception. Suggest me if any changes can be made.

char charInt=character.charAt(0);   
if(charInt>=48 && charInt<=57){
    System.out.println("not character");
}
else
    System.out.println("Character");

Look for ASCII table to see how the int value are hardcoded .

You need to convert your string into character..

String character = in.next();
char myChar = character.charAt(0);

if (Character.isDigit(myChar)) {
   // print true
}

Check Character for other methods..

This is a little tricky, the value you enter at keyboard, is a String value, so you have to pitch the first character with method line.chartAt(0) where, 0 is the index of the first character, and store this value in a char variable as in char c= line.charAt(0) now with the use of method isDigit() and isLetter() from class Character you can differentiate between a Digit and Letter.

here is a code for your program:

import java.util.Scanner;

class Practice
{
 public static void main(String[] args)
  {
   Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
   System.out.println("Input a letter"); 
   String line = in.nextLine();
   char c = line.charAt(0);
   if( Character.isDigit(c))
   System.out.println(c +" Is a digit");
   else if (Character.isLetter(c))
   System.out.println(c +" Is a Letter");
  }

}

You could use the existing methods from the Character class. Take a look at the docs:

http://download.java.net/jdk7/archive/b123/docs/api/java/lang/Character.html#isDigit(char)

So, you could do something like this...

String character = in.next();
char c = character.charAt(0);
...
if (Character.isDigit(c)) { 
    ... 
} else if (Character.isLetter(c)) {
    ...
}
...

If you ever want to know exactly how this is implemented, you could always look at the Java source code.

     char temp = yourString.charAt(0);
     if(Character.isDigit(temp))
     {
         ..........
     }else if (Character.isLetter(temp))
     {
          ......
      }else
     {
      ....
     }

import java.util.*;

public class String_char 
{

    public static void main(String arg[]){   

        Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
        System.out.println("Enter the value");
        String data;
        data = in.next();

        int len = data.length();
        for (int i = 0 ; i < len ; i++){
            char ch = data.charAt(i);

            if ((ch >= '0' && ch <= '9')){
                System.out.println("Number ");
            }
            else if((ch >= 'a' && ch <= 'z') || (ch >= 'A' && ch <= 'Z')){
            System.out.println("Character");
            }
            else{
                System.out.println("Symbol");
             }
        }
    } 
}

This is the way how to check whether a given character is alphabet or not

public static void main(String[] args) {

    Scanner sc = new Scanner(System.in);
    char c = sc.next().charAt(0); 
    if((c >= 'a' && c <= 'z') || (c >= 'A' && c <= 'Z'))
         System.out.println(c + " is an alphabet.");
    else
        System.out.println(c + " is not an alphabet.");
}

By using regular expressions:

boolean isChar = character.matches("[a-zA-z]{1}");
boolean isDigit = character.matches("\\d{1}"); 

Ummm, you guys are forgetting the Character.isLetterOrDigit method:

boolean x;
String character = in.next();
char c = character.charAt(0);
if(Character.isLetterOrDigit(charAt(c)))
{ 
  x = true;
}

You could use:

    if (Character.isLetter(character.charAt(0))){
    ....

You could do this by Regular Expression as follows you could use this code

EditText et = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.editText);
String NumberPattern = "[0-9]+";
String Number = et.getText().toString();

if (Number.matches(NumberPattern) && s.length() > 0)
{ 
    //code for number
}
else
{
    //code for incorrect number pattern
}