Need help with EOFException error

[Bob Zoloman]

Hi, I am trying to fix the following error.
java.io.EOFException
at java.io.DataInputStream.readChar(Unknown Source)
at Decode.main(Decode.java:27)

I have tried using conditions by the first is.readChar() method to test for false and blank characters, but nothing seems to work. Any help is appreciated.

import java.io.*;
 

public class Decode
{
   
    public static void main(String[] args)
    {
        DataInputStream is = null;
        DataOutputStream os = null;
        char ch, next;
        char delimiter = '.';
        short count = 0;
        String contents = null;
        BufferedWriter writer = null;
        
        try
        {
            is = new DataInputStream(new FileInputStream(args[0]));
            writer = new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter(args[1]));
            
            
            while (true)
            {
                
                ch = is.readChar();
                                
                if( ch == delimiter)
                {
                    count = is.readShort();
                    next = is.readChar();
                    
                    System.out.println("writing " + next + " " + count + " times");
                    for(int j = 0; j < count; j++)
                    {
                        writer.write(next);
                    }
                }
                else
                {
                    System.out.println("writing " + ch + " " + 1 + " time");
                    contents = contents + ch;
                    writer.write(ch);
                }
            }
        }
        catch(IOException e)
        {
            e.printStackTrace();
            System.out.println(e.getMessage());
        }
       
      
        finally
        {
            try
            {
                writer.close();
            }
            catch(final IOException ex)
            {
                ex.printStackTrace();
            }
        }
    }
}

[Ernest Friedman-Hill]

Every time through the "while" loop, at least one character is read (at the top of the loop.) Under what circumstances does the loop exit? Should you perhaps be exiting under any other circumstances? Or is this an infinite data stream?

[Bob Zoloman]

I would like to exit when there are no more characters in the file. I'm not sure how to do that. I have tried conditions in the while loop such as;

(while is.available != -1)
 
(while is.readChar != null) 

etc but none of them work. The data stream is something like this.

000100000111110000001 in a textfile.

[ August 05, 2006: Message edited by: Bob Zoloman ]
[ August 05, 2006: Message edited by: Bob Zoloman ]

[Joanne Neal]

An EOFException indicates that the end of the file has been reached. So if you catch this exception, you know you've reached the end of the file.