Dumping A string value???

Hi all,

I have a program that captures a substring between two strings and returns the value instance to an arrayList, however if the value already exists or contains certain symbols I want my program to dump the string and look at the next line.

I have done this with a series of IF statements however, when my program is executed its still returning many string values that contain these character symbols.

I have tried leaving the loop blank thinking that maybe it will just abandon the string within the IF statement if the conditions aren't met. But the string values are still comming through. Another method I have tried is setting the variable value for resourceline to null. But that just causes compiler errors.

Please can someone help

p.s. Apologies if there are any formatting errors

/** Imported Java Libraries */
import java.io.BufferedReader;   
import java.io.File;   
import java.io.FileNotFoundException;   
import java.io.FileReader;   
import java.io.IOException;   
import java.util.ArrayList;   
import java.util.regex.Matcher;   
import java.util.regex.Pattern;   
import java.util.Collections;   
import java.util.List;   
import java.io.PrintWriter;   
import java.io.FileWriter;   
  
/** class to find string */  
public class Find {   
  
    BufferedReader br = null;   
  
    /** method to find the value between the beginning and end of a string*/  
    public Find(String fileName, String begin, String end,String whereToWrite) throws java.io.IOException {   
        try {   
            /** read in file */  
            String resourceline = null;   
            ArrayList<String> arrayList = new ArrayList<String>();   
            File myDir = new File("C:\\Documents and Settings\\Kieren McDonald\\Desktop\\Nick\\Java\\Test\\resources");   
            if (myDir.exists() && myDir.isDirectory()) {   
                File[] files = myDir.listFiles();   
                for (int i = 0; i < files.length; i++) {   
                    br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(files[i]));   
                    while ((resourceline = br.readLine()) != null) {   
                        resourceline = find(begin, end, resourceline);   
                        if (resourceline != null) {
							resourceline = resourceline.trim();
						    boolean checkContains1=resourceline.contains("$");
							boolean checkContains2=resourceline.contains("=");
							boolean checkContains3=resourceline.contains(">");
							boolean checkContains4=resourceline.contains(":");
							if (checkContains1 || checkContains2 || checkContains3 || checkContains4)
							{
								 // resourceline = null;
							}
							if (arrayList.contains(resourceline)){
								 // resourceline = null;
							}
						
						    else{      
                                 arrayList.add(resourceline);   
  
                                }
						}								
  
					}  
                    System.out.println("/**This Is A List Of Includes Within The Component*/");					
                    sortAndPrint(arrayList);
                    System.out.println("/*******This Is The End Of The list Of Includes*******/");					
                    writeResults(arrayList, "C:\\Documents and Settings\\Kieren McDonald\\Desktop\\Nick\\Java\\Test\\filetest.txt");   
                }   
            } else {   
                System.out.println("This is not a directory");   
            }   
  
            /**  
             * declaring string identifiers for beginning and end of string  
             * aswel as one other line string to store the data between  
             */  
            /** while line is not equal to null then find 3 string values */  
        } catch (FileNotFoundException ex) {   
            ex.printStackTrace();   
        } finally {   
            br.close();   
        }   
    }   
  
    /** method to sort and print the array collection */  
    private void sortAndPrint(List<String> results) {   
        Collections.sort(results, String.CASE_INSENSITIVE_ORDER);   
        for (String resourceline : results) {   
            System.out.println(resourceline);   
        }   
    }   
  
    /** method to find the value between the beginning and end of a string  
     */  
    public String find(String beg, String end, String resourceline) {   
        /** match pattern to store string between strings and match to line */  
        Pattern p = Pattern.compile(beg + "(.*)" + end);   
        Matcher m = p.matcher(resourceline);   
        return m.find() ? resourceline.substring(m.start(1), m.end(1)) : null;   
    }   
  
    /** method to print the results of the array into a new document */  
    private void writeResults(ArrayList<String> arrayList, String filename) {   
        try {   
            PrintWriter writer = new PrintWriter(filename);   
  
            for (String resourceline : arrayList) {   
                writer.println(resourceline);   
            }   
            System.err.println("/***Your Data Has Been Written To The File Successfully ");   
            writer.close();   
        } catch (Exception e) {   
            System.out.println("can't create output file \"" + filename + "\"");   
            e.printStackTrace();   
        }   
    }    
  
    /** main method to find the resource name calling */  
	public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException
    {   
       Find f = new Find("myDir", "<\\$", "=", "C:\\Documents and Settings\\Kieren McDonald\\Desktop\\Nick\\Java\\Test\\filetest.txt");   
	}   
	 
	 
	 
	}

Your addition of "resourceline" to the array list is completely independent of whether or not "resourceline" contains any of the characters--it sounds like that's not what you want.

Basically if there is a value within the resourceline I want it to first trim the value and then iterate through the statements. I am expecting the If statments to search the string to see if it contains any of the symbol characters. If a character is found within the string then set the string to null (i.e dump the entire string value) and do the same thing If the value already exists within the arrayList.

Otherwise if the resourceline value does not contain any conflicting irrelevant data only then add to the array.

So how is the array being populated with all the crap IF im only adding the value after iterating through the IF statements. It just doesn't make sense to me. Surely it would only add the value If the data was correct?

regards S

I believe i just had a eureka moment.

I changed my code to the example shown below and it seems to have worked, i realise i missed the else if aswel

Why set resourceline to null? You just set it again a statement later.

I realise that there are two possibilities for this i.e. the method from the previous post and also the solution below.

I was just testing the first method at the time, and posted.
By the looks of it the only issue i have now is that the odd occurance of a single character has come through as a variable on the odd occasion.

So i need to find if the value is equal to one character and add that to the If or scenario.

I was actually just asking why you set resourceline to null, because you immediately set it again the next time through the "while" loop.

I see what you mean now, i have removed it from the if statement.

regards S