An abstract subclass of
java.io.InputStream that allows seeking within the input, similar to the
RandomAccessFile class. Additionally, the
DataInput interface is supported and extended to include support for little-endian representations of fundamental data types.
In addition to the familiar methods from InputStream, the methods getFilePointer(), seek(), are defined as in the RandomAccessFile class. The canSeekBackwards() method will return true if it is permissible to seek to a position earlier in the stream than the current value of getFilePointer(). Some subclasses of SeekableStream guarantee the ability to seek backwards while others may not offer this feature in the interest of providing greater efficiency for those users who do not require it.
The DataInput interface is supported as well. This included the skipBytes() and readFully() methods and a variety of read methods for various data types.
Three classes are provided for the purpose of adapting a standard InputStream to the SeekableStream interface. ForwardSeekableStream does not allows seeking backwards, but is inexpensive to use. FileCacheSeekableStream maintains a copy of all of the data read from the input in a temporary file; this file will be discarded automatically when the FileSeekableStream is finalized, or when the JVM exits normally. FileCacheSeekableStream is intended to be reasonably efficient apart from the unavoidable use of disk space. In circumstances where the creation of a temporary file is not possible, MemoryCacheSeekableStream may be used. MemoryCacheSeekableStream creates a potentially large in-memory buffer to store the stream data and so should be avoided when possible.
The FileSeekableStream class wraps a File or RandomAccessFile. It forwards requests to the real underlying file. It performs a limited amount of caching in order to avoid excessive I/O costs.
The SegmentedSeekableStream class performs a different sort of function. It creates a SeekableStream from another SeekableStream by selecting a series of portions or "segments". Each segment starts at a specified location within the source SeekableStream and extends for a specified number of bytes. The StreamSegmentMapper interface and StreamSegment class may be used to compute the segment positions dynamically.
A convenience methods, wrapInputStream is provided to construct a suitable SeekableStream instance whose data is supplied by a given InputStream. The caller, by means of the canSeekBackwards parameter, determines whether support for seeking backwards is required.