Buffers in Java

Buffers in Java
An Introduction

Prof. David Bernstein
James Madison University

Computer Science Department

bernstdh@jmu.edu

Recall

Stream:
- An infinitely long sequence of bytes that can be read from and/or written to
Buffer:
- A fixed amount of data that cam be sent to or received from an I/O component

The Java Class Hierarchy

Properties

Readability:
- All Buffer objects are readable
Writeability:
- Mutators are optional so not all Buffer objects are writeable
- Invocations of optional methods will result in a ReadOnlyBufferException being thrown
- Writeability can be checked with the isReadOnly() method

Important Operations