Class DataInputStream

Class java.io.DataInputStream

Class Members | This Package | All Packages
java.lang.Object
   |
   +----java.io.InputStream
           |
           +----java.io.FilterInputStream
                   |
                   +----java.io.DataInputStream

public class DataInputStream
extends FilterInputStream
implements DataInput

A data input stream lets an application read primitive Java data types from an underlying input stream in a machine-independent way. An application uses a data output stream to write data that can later be read by a data input stream.

Data input streams and data output streams represent Unicode strings in a format that is a slight modification of UTF-8. (For more information, see X/Open Company Ltd., "File System Safe UCS Transformation Format (FSS_UTF)", X/Open Preliminary Specification, Document Number: P316. This information also appears in ISO/IEC 10646, Annex P.)

All characters in the range '\u0001' to '\u007F' are represented by a single byte:

0 bits 0-7

The null character '\u0000' and characters in the range '\u0080' to '\u07FF' are represented by a pair of bytes:

1 1 0 bits 6-10
1 0 bits 0-5

Characters in the range '\u0800' to '\uFFFF' are represented by three bytes:
1 1 1 0 bits 12-15
1 0 bits 6-11
1 0 bits 0-5

The two differences between this format and the "standard" UTF-8 format are the following:

See Also:
DataOutputStream