How to construct a relative path in Java from two absolute paths (or URLs)?

Question

Given two absolute paths, e.g.

/var/data/stuff/xyz.dat
/var/data

How can one create a relative path that uses the second path as its base?

Answer 1

When using java.net.URI.relativize you should be aware of Java bug: JDK-6226081 (URI should be able to relativize paths with partial roots)

At the moment, the relativize() method of URI will only relativize URIs when one is a prefix of the other.

Which essentially means java.net.URI.relativize will not create ".."'s for you.