Question

I would like to know whether or not there is some way of marking a file to identify whether or not the file contains x.

Consider the following example:

During a batch conversion process I am creating a log file which lists the success / failure of individual conversions.

So the process is as follows:

• start conversion process
• create log file named batch_XXX_yyyy_mm_dd.log
• try to convert ‘a’
• write success to log file
• try to convert ‘b’
• write success to log file
• …
• try to convert ‘z’
• write success to log file
• close and persist log file

What I would like to be able to do is mark a file in some way that identifies whether any of the conversions logged in the file were unsuccessful.

I do not want to change the file name (visibly) and I do not want to open the file to check for a marker.

Does anyone have any ideas on how this could be achieved?

Answer 1

You can add file attributes in Java 7 through the java.nio.file.Files class.

So it would be possible to mark whether a file contains X using the Files.setAttribute() method:

Files.setAttribute( "path/to/file", "containsX", true );

And then check whether the file does contain X using the Files.getAttribute( ) method:

Files.getAttribute( "path/to/file", "containsX" )