Java – Reader to InputStream

In this quick tutorial we’re going to look at the conversion from a Reader to an InputStream – first with plain Java, then with Guava and finally with the Apache Commons IO library.

This article is part of the “Java – Back to Basic” series here on VietMX’s Blog.

1. With Java

Let’s start with the Java solution:

@Test
public void givenUsingPlainJava_whenConvertingReaderIntoInputStream_thenCorrect() 
  throws IOException {
    Reader initialReader = new StringReader("With Java");

    char[] charBuffer = new char[8 * 1024];
    StringBuilder builder = new StringBuilder();
    int numCharsRead;
    while ((numCharsRead = initialReader.read(charBuffer, 0, charBuffer.length)) != -1) {
        builder.append(charBuffer, 0, numCharsRead);
    }
    InputStream targetStream = new ByteArrayInputStream(
      builder.toString().getBytes(StandardCharsets.UTF_8));

    initialReader.close();
    targetStream.close();
}

Notice that we’re reading (and writing) chunks of data at a time.

2. With Guava

Next – let’s look at the much simpler Guava solution:

@Test
public void givenUsingGuava_whenConvertingReaderIntoInputStream_thenCorrect() 
  throws IOException {
    Reader initialReader = new StringReader("With Guava");

    InputStream targetStream = 
      new ByteArrayInputStream(CharStreams.toString(initialReader)
      .getBytes(Charsets.UTF_8));

    initialReader.close();
    targetStream.close();
}

Notice that we’re using an out of the box input stream which turns the entire conversion into a one liner.

3. With Commons IO

Finally – let’s look at the Commons IO solution – also a simple one liner:

@Test
public void givenUsingCommonsIO_whenConvertingReaderIntoInputStream() 
  throws IOException {
    Reader initialReader = new StringReader("With Commons IO");

    InputStream targetStream = 
      IOUtils.toInputStream(IOUtils.toString(initialReader), Charsets.UTF_8);

    initialReader.close();
    targetStream.close();
}

Note that we’re here dealing with any kind of Reader – but if you’re working specifically with text data, it’s always a good idea to specify the charset explicitly rather than use the JVM default.

And there you have it – 3 simple ways to transform the Reader into an InputStream. Make sure to check out the sample over on GitHub.