When to use “getResourceAsStream” method?

Question

I was confused using the said method because while loading some properties file people are following a different approaches...

Properties prop 
 = new Proper         


        

Answer 1

When reading a file from the filesystem use a FileInputStream(File()) using relative or absolute paths.

when your program is distributed as a jar and you need to load a file that is inside that jar, you need to use getResourceAsStream(), it will search the classpath for the file, and the path is relative to the classpath.