[java] How to append text to an existing file in Java?

I need to append text repeatedly to an existing file in Java. How do I do that?

This question is related to java file-io io text-files

The answer is


Using Apache Commons 2.1:

FileUtils.writeStringToFile(file, "String to append", true);

FileOutputStream stream = new FileOutputStream(path, true);
try {

    stream.write(

        string.getBytes("UTF-8") // Choose your encoding.

    );

} finally {
    stream.close();
}

Then catch an IOException somewhere upstream.


Try with bufferFileWriter.append, it works with me.

FileWriter fileWriter;
try {
    fileWriter = new FileWriter(file,true);
    BufferedWriter bufferFileWriter = new BufferedWriter(fileWriter);
    bufferFileWriter.append(obj.toJSONString());
    bufferFileWriter.newLine();
    bufferFileWriter.close();
} catch (IOException ex) {
    Logger.getLogger(JsonTest.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
}

In case you want to ADD SOME TEXT IN SPECIFIC LINES you can first read the whole file, append the text wherever you want and then overwrite everything like in the code below:

public static void addDatatoFile(String data1, String data2){


    String fullPath = "/home/user/dir/file.csv";

    File dir = new File(fullPath);
    List<String> l = new LinkedList<String>();

    try (BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(dir))) {
        String line;
        int count = 0;

        while ((line = br.readLine()) != null) {
            if(count == 1){
                //add data at the end of second line                    
                line += data1;
            }else if(count == 2){
                //add other data at the end of third line
                line += data2;
            }
            l.add(line);
            count++;
        }
        br.close();
    } catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
    } catch (IOException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
    }       
    createFileFromList(l, dir);
}

public static void createFileFromList(List<String> list, File f){

    PrintWriter writer;
    try {
        writer = new PrintWriter(f, "UTF-8");
        for (String d : list) {
            writer.println(d.toString());
        }
        writer.close();             
    } catch (FileNotFoundException | UnsupportedEncodingException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
    }
}

In Java-7 it also can be done such kind:

import java.nio.file.Files;
import java.nio.file.Path;
import java.nio.file.Paths;
import java.nio.file.StandardOpenOption;

//---------------------

Path filePath = Paths.get("someFile.txt");
if (!Files.exists(filePath)) {
    Files.createFile(filePath);
}
Files.write(filePath, "Text to be added".getBytes(), StandardOpenOption.APPEND);

You can use fileWriter with a flag set to true , for appending.

try
{
    String filename= "MyFile.txt";
    FileWriter fw = new FileWriter(filename,true); //the true will append the new data
    fw.write("add a line\n");//appends the string to the file
    fw.close();
}
catch(IOException ioe)
{
    System.err.println("IOException: " + ioe.getMessage());
}

Make sure the stream gets properly closed in all scenarios.

It's a bit alarming how many of these answers leave the file handle open in case of an error. The answer https://stackoverflow.com/a/15053443/2498188 is on the money but only because BufferedWriter() cannot throw. If it could then an exception would leave the FileWriter object open.

A more general way of doing this that doesn't care if BufferedWriter() can throw:

  PrintWriter out = null;
  BufferedWriter bw = null;
  FileWriter fw = null;
  try{
     fw = new FileWriter("outfilename", true);
     bw = new BufferedWriter(fw);
     out = new PrintWriter(bw);
     out.println("the text");
  }
  catch( IOException e ){
     // File writing/opening failed at some stage.
  }
  finally{
     try{
        if( out != null ){
           out.close(); // Will close bw and fw too
        }
        else if( bw != null ){
           bw.close(); // Will close fw too
        }
        else if( fw != null ){
           fw.close();
        }
        else{
           // Oh boy did it fail hard! :3
        }
     }
     catch( IOException e ){
        // Closing the file writers failed for some obscure reason
     }
  }

Edit:

As of Java 7, the recommended way is to use "try with resources" and let the JVM deal with it:

  try(    FileWriter fw = new FileWriter("outfilename", true);
          BufferedWriter bw = new BufferedWriter(fw);
          PrintWriter out = new PrintWriter(bw)){
     out.println("the text");
  }  
  catch( IOException e ){
      // File writing/opening failed at some stage.
  }

You can use the follong code to append the content in the file:

 String fileName="/home/shriram/Desktop/Images/"+"test.txt";
  FileWriter fw=new FileWriter(fileName,true);    
  fw.write("here will be you content to insert or append in file");    
  fw.close(); 
  FileWriter fw1=new FileWriter(fileName,true);    
 fw1.write("another content will be here to be append in the same file");    
 fw1.close(); 

Better to use try-with-resources then all that pre-java 7 finally business

static void appendStringToFile(Path file, String s) throws IOException  {
    try (BufferedWriter out = Files.newBufferedWriter(file, StandardCharsets.UTF_8, StandardOpenOption.APPEND)) {
        out.append(s);
        out.newLine();
    }
}

1.7 Approach:

void appendToFile(String filePath, String content) throws IOException{

    Path path = Paths.get(filePath);

    try (BufferedWriter writer = 
            Files.newBufferedWriter(path, 
                    StandardOpenOption.APPEND)) {
        writer.newLine();
        writer.append(content);
    }

    /*
    //Alternative:
    try (BufferedWriter bWriter = 
            Files.newBufferedWriter(path, 
                    StandardOpenOption.WRITE, StandardOpenOption.APPEND);
            PrintWriter pWriter = new PrintWriter(bWriter)
            ) {
        pWriter.println();//to have println() style instead of newLine();   
        pWriter.append(content);//Also, bWriter.append(content);
    }*/
}

Shouldn't all of the answers here with try/catch blocks have the .close() pieces contained in a finally block?

Example for marked answer:

PrintWriter out = null;
try {
    out = new PrintWriter(new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter("writePath", true)));
    out.println("the text");
} catch (IOException e) {
    System.err.println(e);
} finally {
    if (out != null) {
        out.close();
    }
} 

Also, as of Java 7, you can use a try-with-resources statement. No finally block is required for closing the declared resource(s) because it is handled automatically, and is also less verbose:

try(PrintWriter out = new PrintWriter(new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter("writePath", true)))) {
    out.println("the text");
} catch (IOException e) {
    System.err.println(e);
}

Create a function anywhere in your project and simply call that function where ever you need it.

Guys you got to remember that you guys are calling active threads that you are not calling asynchronously and since it would likely be a good 5 to 10 pages to get it done right. Why not spend more time on your project and forget about writing anything already written. Properly

    //Adding a static modifier would make this accessible anywhere in your app

    public Logger getLogger()
    {
       return java.util.logging.Logger.getLogger("MyLogFileName");
    }
    //call the method anywhere and append what you want to log 
    //Logger class will take care of putting timestamps for you
    //plus the are ansychronously done so more of the 
    //processing power will go into your application

    //from inside a function body in the same class ...{...

    getLogger().log(Level.INFO,"the text you want to append");

    ...}...
    /*********log file resides in server root log files********/

three lines of code two really since the third actually appends text. :P


Slightly expanding on Kip's answer, here is a simple Java 7+ method to append a new line to a file, creating it if it doesn't already exist:

try {
    final Path path = Paths.get("path/to/filename.txt");
    Files.write(path, Arrays.asList("New line to append"), StandardCharsets.UTF_8,
        Files.exists(path) ? StandardOpenOption.APPEND : StandardOpenOption.CREATE);
} catch (final IOException ioe) {
    // Add your own exception handling...
}

Further notes:

  1. The above uses the Files.write overload that writes lines of text to a file (i.e. similar to a println command). To just write text to the end (i.e. similar to a print command), an alternative Files.write overload can be used, passing in a byte array (e.g. "mytext".getBytes(StandardCharsets.UTF_8)).

  2. The CREATE option will only work if the specified directory already exists - if it doesn't, a NoSuchFileException is thrown. If required, the following code could be added after setting path to create the directory structure:

    Path pathParent = path.getParent();
    if (!Files.exists(pathParent)) {
        Files.createDirectories(pathParent);
    }
    

FileOutputStream fos = new FileOutputStream("File_Name", true);
fos.write(data);

the true allows to append the data in the existing file. If we will write

FileOutputStream fos = new FileOutputStream("File_Name");

It will overwrite the existing file. So go for first approach.


Sample, using Guava:

File to = new File("C:/test/test.csv");

for (int i = 0; i < 42; i++) {
    CharSequence from = "some string" + i + "\n";
    Files.append(from, to, Charsets.UTF_8);
}

/**********************************************************************
 * it will write content to a specified  file
 * 
 * @param keyString
 * @throws IOException
 *********************************************************************/
public static void writeToFile(String keyString,String textFilePAth) throws IOException {
    // For output to file
    File a = new File(textFilePAth);

    if (!a.exists()) {
        a.createNewFile();
    }
    FileWriter fw = new FileWriter(a.getAbsoluteFile(), true);
    BufferedWriter bw = new BufferedWriter(fw);
    bw.append(keyString);
    bw.newLine();
    bw.close();
}// end of writeToFile()

Library

import java.io.BufferedWriter;
import java.io.File;
import java.io.FileWriter;
import java.io.IOException;

Code

public void append()
{
    try
    {
        String path = "D:/sample.txt";

        File file = new File(path);

        FileWriter fileWriter = new FileWriter(file,true);

        BufferedWriter bufferFileWriter  = new BufferedWriter(fileWriter);

        fileWriter.append("Sample text in the file to append");

        bufferFileWriter.close();

        System.out.println("User Registration Completed");

    }catch(Exception ex)
    {
        System.out.println(ex);
    }
}

import java.io.BufferedWriter;
import java.io.FileWriter;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.PrintWriter;

public class Writer {


    public static void main(String args[]){
        doWrite("output.txt","Content to be appended to file");
    }

    public static void doWrite(String filePath,String contentToBeAppended){

       try(
            FileWriter fw = new FileWriter(filePath, true);
            BufferedWriter bw = new BufferedWriter(fw);
            PrintWriter out = new PrintWriter(bw)
          )
          {
            out.println(contentToBeAppended);
          }  
        catch( IOException e ){
        // File writing/opening failed at some stage.
        }

    }

}

You can also try this :

JFileChooser c= new JFileChooser();
c.showOpenDialog(c);
File write_file = c.getSelectedFile();
String Content = "Writing into file"; //what u would like to append to the file



try 
{
    RandomAccessFile raf = new RandomAccessFile(write_file, "rw");
    long length = raf.length();
    //System.out.println(length);
    raf.setLength(length + 1); //+ (integer value) for spacing
    raf.seek(raf.length());
    raf.writeBytes(Content);
    raf.close();
} 
catch (Exception e) {
    //any exception handling method of ur choice
}

This code will fulifil your need:

   FileWriter fw=new FileWriter("C:\\file.json",true);
   fw.write("ssssss");
   fw.close();

    String str;
    String path = "C:/Users/...the path..../iin.txt"; // you can input also..i created this way :P

    BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(System.in));
    PrintWriter pw = new PrintWriter(new FileWriter(path, true));

    try 
    {
       while(true)
        {
            System.out.println("Enter the text : ");
            str = br.readLine();
            if(str.equalsIgnoreCase("exit"))
                break;
            else
                pw.println(str);
        }
    } 
    catch (Exception e) 
    {
        //oh noes!
    }
    finally
    {
        pw.close();         
    }

this will do what you intend for..


java 7+

In my humble opinion since I am fan of plain java, I would suggest something that it is a combination of the aforementioned answers. Maybe I am late for the party. Here is the code:

 String sampleText = "test" +  System.getProperty("line.separator");
 Files.write(Paths.get(filePath), sampleText.getBytes(StandardCharsets.UTF_8), 
 StandardOpenOption.CREATE, StandardOpenOption.APPEND);

If the file doesn't exist, it creates it and if already exists it appends the sampleText to the existing file. Using this, saves you from adding unnecessary libs to your classpath.


For JDK version >= 7

You can utilise this simple method which appends the given content to the specified file:

void appendToFile(String filePath, String content) {
  try (FileWriter fw = new FileWriter(filePath, true)) {
    fw.write(content + System.lineSeparator());
  } catch (IOException e) { 
    // TODO handle exception
  }
}

We are constructing a FileWriter object in append mode.


I just add small detail:

    new FileWriter("outfilename", true)

2.nd parameter (true) is a feature (or, interface) called appendable (http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/lang/Appendable.html). It is responsible for being able to add some content to the end of particular file/stream. This interface is implemented since Java 1.5. Each object (i.e. BufferedWriter, CharArrayWriter, CharBuffer, FileWriter, FilterWriter, LogStream, OutputStreamWriter, PipedWriter, PrintStream, PrintWriter, StringBuffer, StringBuilder, StringWriter, Writer) with this interface can be used for adding content

In other words, you can add some content to your gzipped file, or some http process


The following method let's you append text to some file:

private void appendToFile(String filePath, String text)
{
    PrintWriter fileWriter = null;

    try
    {
        fileWriter = new PrintWriter(new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter(
                filePath, true)));

        fileWriter.println(text);
    } catch (IOException ioException)
    {
        ioException.printStackTrace();
    } finally
    {
        if (fileWriter != null)
        {
            fileWriter.close();
        }
    }
}

Alternatively using FileUtils:

public static void appendToFile(String filePath, String text) throws IOException
{
    File file = new File(filePath);

    if(!file.exists())
    {
        file.createNewFile();
    }

    String fileContents = FileUtils.readFileToString(file);

    if(file.length() != 0)
    {
        fileContents = fileContents.concat(System.lineSeparator());
    }

    fileContents = fileContents.concat(text);

    FileUtils.writeStringToFile(file, fileContents);
}

It is not efficient but works fine. Line breaks are handled correctly and a new file is created if one didn't exist yet.


If we are using Java 7 and above and also know the content to be added (appended) to the file we can make use of newBufferedWriter method in NIO package.

public static void main(String[] args) {
    Path FILE_PATH = Paths.get("C:/temp", "temp.txt");
    String text = "\n Welcome to Java 8";

    //Writing to the file temp.txt
    try (BufferedWriter writer = Files.newBufferedWriter(FILE_PATH, StandardCharsets.UTF_8, StandardOpenOption.APPEND)) {
        writer.write(text);
    } catch (IOException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
    }
}

There are few points to note:

  1. It is always a good habit to specify charset encoding and for that we have constant in class StandardCharsets.
  2. The code uses try-with-resource statement in which resources are automatically closed after the try.

Though OP has not asked but just in case we want to search for lines having some specific keyword e.g. confidential we can make use of stream APIs in Java:

//Reading from the file the first line which contains word "confidential"
try {
    Stream<String> lines = Files.lines(FILE_PATH);
    Optional<String> containsJava = lines.filter(l->l.contains("confidential")).findFirst();
    if(containsJava.isPresent()){
        System.out.println(containsJava.get());
    }
} catch (IOException e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
}

I might suggest the apache commons project. This project already provides a framework for doing what you need (i.e. flexible filtering of collections).


My answer:

JFileChooser chooser= new JFileChooser();
chooser.showOpenDialog(chooser);
File file = chooser.getSelectedFile();
String Content = "What you want to append to file";

try 
{
    RandomAccessFile random = new RandomAccessFile(file, "rw");
    long length = random.length();
    random.setLength(length + 1);
    random.seek(random.length());
    random.writeBytes(Content);
    random.close();
} 
catch (Exception exception) {
    //exception handling
}

Using java.nio.Files along with java.nio.file.StandardOpenOption

    PrintWriter out = null;
    BufferedWriter bufWriter;

    try{
        bufWriter =
            Files.newBufferedWriter(
                Paths.get("log.txt"),
                Charset.forName("UTF8"),
                StandardOpenOption.WRITE, 
                StandardOpenOption.APPEND,
                StandardOpenOption.CREATE);
        out = new PrintWriter(bufWriter, true);
    }catch(IOException e){
        //Oh, no! Failed to create PrintWriter
    }

    //After successful creation of PrintWriter
    out.println("Text to be appended");

    //After done writing, remember to close!
    out.close();

This creates a BufferedWriter using Files, which accepts StandardOpenOption parameters, and an auto-flushing PrintWriter from the resultant BufferedWriter. PrintWriter's println() method, can then be called to write to the file.

The StandardOpenOption parameters used in this code: opens the file for writing, only appends to the file, and creates the file if it does not exist.

Paths.get("path here") can be replaced with new File("path here").toPath(). And Charset.forName("charset name") can be modified to accommodate the desired Charset.


This can be done in one line of code. Hope this helps :)

Files.write(Paths.get(fileName), msg.getBytes(), StandardOpenOption.APPEND);

Examples related to java

Under what circumstances can I call findViewById with an Options Menu / Action Bar item? How much should a function trust another function How to implement a simple scenario the OO way Two constructors How do I get some variable from another class in Java? this in equals method How to split a string in two and store it in a field How to do perspective fixing? String index out of range: 4 My eclipse won't open, i download the bundle pack it keeps saying error log

Examples related to file-io

Python, Pandas : write content of DataFrame into text File Saving response from Requests to file How to while loop until the end of a file in Python without checking for empty line? Getting "java.nio.file.AccessDeniedException" when trying to write to a folder How do I add a resources folder to my Java project in Eclipse Read and write a String from text file Python Pandas: How to read only first n rows of CSV files in? Open files in 'rt' and 'wt' modes How to write to a file without overwriting current contents? Write objects into file with Node.js

Examples related to io

Reading file using relative path in python project How to write to a CSV line by line? Getting "java.nio.file.AccessDeniedException" when trying to write to a folder Exception: Unexpected end of ZLIB input stream How to get File Created Date and Modified Date Printing Mongo query output to a file while in the mongo shell Load data from txt with pandas Writing File to Temp Folder How to get resources directory path programmatically ValueError : I/O operation on closed file

Examples related to text-files

How to edit a text file in my terminal Reading specific columns from a text file in python Read a local text file using Javascript Split text file into smaller multiple text file using command line How do I read a text file of about 2 GB? Java - How Can I Write My ArrayList to a file, and Read (load) that file to the original ArrayList? Copying from one text file to another using Python Getting all file names from a folder using C# Reading From A Text File - Batch How to import data from text file to mysql database