java.net.URL read stream to byte[]

Question

I`m trying to read an image from an URL (with the java package java.net.URL) to a byte[]. \"Everything\" works fine, except that the content isnt being ent

Answer 1

Use commons-io IOUtils.toByteArray(URL):

String url = "http://localhost:8080/images/anImage.jpg";
byte[] fileContent = IOUtils.toByteArray(new URL(url));

Maven dependency:

<dependency>
    <groupId>commons-io</groupId>
    <artifactId>commons-io</artifactId>
    <version>2.6</version>
</dependency>

Answer 2

Here's a clean solution:

private byte[] downloadUrl(URL toDownload) {
    ByteArrayOutputStream outputStream = new ByteArrayOutputStream();

    try {
        byte[] chunk = new byte[4096];
        int bytesRead;
        InputStream stream = toDownload.openStream();

        while ((bytesRead = stream.read(chunk)) > 0) {
            outputStream.write(chunk, 0, bytesRead);
        }

    } catch (IOException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
        return null;
    }

    return outputStream.toByteArray();
}