How to call a java method so I can pass a file into the method

Question

I want to pass a file into a java method method from the main method. Can anyone give me some help as to how I pass the file into the method - do I pass the file name ? are there any special points I need to put in the methods signature etc ?
FileReader file = new FileReader("Scores");
BufferedReader infile = new BufferedReader(file);
Where am I supposed to put the above text - in the main method or the one I want to pass the file into to?
Thanks

Answer 1

It's a matter of personal preference really. I would encapsulate all of the file-parsing logic in a separate class that implements an interface so that if in the future you want to start taking the integers from another source, e.g. a db, you wouldn't need to drastically alter your main application code. Probably something like this, (with an assumption that the numbers are delimited by a comma and a realisation that my file-handling routine sucks):
public class MyApp{
public static void main(String[] args){
IntegerGather g = new FileIntegerGatherer();
Integer[] result = g.getIntegers(args[0]);
public interface IntegerGatherer{
public Integer[] getIntegers(String location);
import java.io.*;
public class FileIntegerGatherer implements IntegerGatherer{
public Integer[] getIntegers(String location){
FileInputStream fs=null;
try{
File f = new File(location);
fs = new FileInputStream(f);
byte[] in = new byte[1024];
StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer();
while((fs.read(in))!=-1){
sb.append(new String(in));
StringTokenizer st = new StringTokenizer(sb.toString(),",");
Integer[] result = new Integer[st.countTokens()];
int count = 0;
while(st.hasMoreTokens()){
result[count]=Integer.valueOf(st.nextToken());
count++;
catch(IOException e){
//something sensible here
finally{
if(fs!=null){
try{
fs.close();
catch(IOException f){
return result;
Once compiled you could invoke it as java MyApp c:\myInts.txt
Sorry if there are typos in there, I don't have an ide open ;->