Java™ I/O, NIO, and NIO.2

Java I/O support is included in the java.io and java.nio packages. Together these packages include the following features:

• Input and output through data streams, serialization and the file system.
• Charsets, decoders, and encoders, for translating between bytes and Unicode characters.
• Access to file, file attributes and file systems.
• APIs for building scalable servers using asynchronous or multiplexed, non-blocking I/O.

Tutorials and Programmer's Guides

• The Basic I/O section of The Java Tutorial and, in particular, File I/O (featuring NIO.2)
• Developing a Custom File System Provider
• Zip File System Provider
• Troubleshooting Tips

API Specification

• java.io (description) - Supports system input and output, and object serialization. to the file system
• java.nio (description) - Defines buffers for bulk memory operations. Buffers may be allocated in direct memory for high performance.
• java.nio.channels (description) - Defines channels, an abstraction for devices capable of performing I/O operations; defines selectors for multiplexed, non-blocking I/O
• java.nio.channels.spi (description) - Provides implementations for channels
• java.nio.file - Defines interfaces and classes to access files and file systems.
• java.nio.file.attribute - Defines interfaces and classes for accessing file system attributes.
• java.nio.file.spi - Defines classes for creating a file system implementation.
• java.nio.charset (description) - Defines charsets, decoders, and encoders, for translating between bytes and Unicode characters
• java.nio.charset.spi (description) - Provides implementations for charsets

Examples

• NIO and NIO.2 Examples

Enhancements

• Enhancements in Java SE 7
• Enhancements in Java SE 6
• Enhancements in J2SE 5.0
• Enhancements in J2SDK 1.4
• Previous Enhancements

More Information

• Supported Encodings
• Object Serialization