How do I programmatically determine operating system in Java?

Question

I would like to determine the operating system of the host that my Java program is running programmatically (for example: I would like to be able to load different propertie

Answer 1

Oct. 2008:

I would recommend to cache it in a static variable:

public static final class OsUtils
{
   private static String OS = null;
   public static String getOsName()
   {
      if(OS == null) { OS = System.getProperty("os.name"); }
      return OS;
   }
   public static boolean isWindows()
   {
      return getOsName().startsWith("Windows");
   }

   public static boolean isUnix() // and so on
}

That way, every time you ask for the Os, you do not fetch the property more than once in the lifetime of your application.

---

February 2016: 7+ years later:

There is a bug with Windows 10 (which did not exist at the time of the original answer).
See "Java's “os.name” for Windows 10?"