Java – delete line from text file by overwriting while reading it

As others have pointed out, you might be better off using a temporary file, if there’s a slightest risk that your program crashes mid way:

public static void removeNthLine(String f, int toRemove) throws IOException {

    File tmp = File.createTempFile("tmp", "");

    BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(f));
    BufferedWriter bw = new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter(tmp));

    for (int i = 0; i < toRemove; i++)
        bw.write(String.format("%s%n", br.readLine()));

    br.readLine();

    String l;
    while (null != (l = br.readLine()))
        bw.write(String.format("%s%n", l));

    br.close();
    bw.close();

    File oldFile = new File(f);
    if (oldFile.delete())
        tmp.renameTo(oldFile);

}

(Beware of the sloppy treatment of encodings, new-line characters and exception handling.)

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However, I don’t like answering questions with “I won’t tell you how, because you shouldn’t do it anyway.“. (In some other situation for instance, you may be working with a file that’s larger than half your hard drive!) So here goes:

You need to use a RandomAccessFile instead. Using this class you can both read and write to the file using the same object:

public static void removeNthLine(String f, int toRemove) throws IOException {
    RandomAccessFile raf = new RandomAccessFile(f, "rw");

    // Leave the n first lines unchanged.
    for (int i = 0; i < toRemove; i++)
        raf.readLine();

    // Shift remaining lines upwards.
    long writePos = raf.getFilePointer();
    raf.readLine();
    long readPos = raf.getFilePointer();

    byte[] buf = new byte[1024];
    int n;
    while (-1 != (n = raf.read(buf))) {
        raf.seek(writePos);
        raf.write(buf, 0, n);
        readPos += n;
        writePos += n;
        raf.seek(readPos);
    }

    raf.setLength(writePos);
    raf.close();
}