Here's a Java 7 solution that uses Guava's excellent support library and the try-with-resources construct. It reads and writes properties files using UTF-8 for the simplest overall experience.
To read a properties file as UTF-8:
File file = new File("/path/to/example.properties");
// Create an empty set of properties
Properties properties = new Properties();
if (file.exists()) {
// Use a UTF-8 reader from Guava
try (Reader reader = Files.newReader(file, Charsets.UTF_8)) {
properties.load(reader);
} catch (IOException e) {
// Do something
}
}
To write a properties file as UTF-8:
File file = new File("/path/to/example.properties");
// Use a UTF-8 writer from Guava
try (Writer writer = Files.newWriter(file, Charsets.UTF_8)) {
properties.store(writer, "Your title here");
writer.flush();
} catch (IOException e) {
// Do something
}