Question

I have a file in my resources folder in my project in Eclipse. I need a way in which to load this document into my Java file. Preferable representation would be in an InputStream.

I tried the following based on some searching but it does not seem to be working and I am not sure why (I get null), any help appreciated

InputStream is = getClass().getResourceAsStream("/Project/resources/BlankPDF.pdf");

Answer 1

The string which you pass as an argument to getResourceAsStream has to be either the location relative to the class you call getResourceAsStream from, or absolute w.r.t. any of your source folders, with a leading /.

So if resources is a source folder in your project (marked with a little package-like symbol in Eclipse) then getClass().getResourceAsStream("/BlankPDF.pdf") should work.

Example: Say you have the following folders and packages in your project, source folders being marked with a *:

Project
    src*
        com.package.foo
            MyClass.java
    resources*
        BlankPDF.pdf

Then both MyClass.class.getResourceAsStream("/BlankPDF.pdf") (leading /, absolute) and MyClass.class.getResourceAsStream("../../../BlankPDF.pdf") (no leading /, relative) should get you the file.