is it possible to prepend files add text or lines at the beginning of the file vs only append?

I'm not aware of a one-liner for doing this. I'd recommend creating a temporary file, writing your text to it, then copying the existing file to the end of the tmp file. Then close the tmp file and move it over the old file, replacing it.

File f = new File(path)

if (!f.exists()) throw new FileNotFoundException(path + " does not exist")

File tmp = File.createTempFile("prepending", ".txt")

tmp.write(text + "n")

tmp.append(f.getText())

tmp.renameTo(f)

I haven't tried this, but I think this will do what you want:

RandomAccessFile raf = new RandomAccessFile( new File("TheFile.txt"), "rw");

raf.seek( 0 ); /*This is the position in the file that you want to write */

raf.writeChars("Hey there");

raf.close();

Edited May 1, 200817 yr by Guest

I think that overwrites instead of appending. It also seems to write it in an odd encoding.