URL class in Java with Examples

The URL class is the gateway to any of the resource available on internet. A Class URL represents a Uniform Resource Locator, which is a pointer to a “resource” on the World Wide Web. A resource can point to a simple file or directory, or it can refer to a more complicated object, such as a query to a database or to a search engine

What is a URL?
As many of you must be knowing that Uniform Resource Locator-URL is a string of text that identifies all the resources on Internet, telling us the address of the resource, how to communicate with it and retrieve something from it.

A Simple URL looks like:

Components of a URL:-
A URL can have many forms. The most general however follows three-components system-

Protocol: HTTP is the protocol here
Hostname: Name of the machine on which the resource lives.
File Name: The path name to the file on the machine.
Port Number: Port number to which to connect (typically optional).

Some constructors for URL class:-

URL(String address) throws MalformedURLException: It creates a URL object from the specified String.
URL(String protocol, String host, String file): Creates a URL object from the specified protcol, host, and file name.
URL(String protocol, String host, int port, String file): Creates a URL object from protocol, host, port and file name.
URL(URL context, String spec): Creates a URL object by parsing the given spec in the given context.
URL(String protocol, String host, int port, String file, URLStreamHandler handler):-
Creates a URL object from the specified protocol, host, port number, file, and handler.
URL(URL context, String spec, URLStreamHandler handler):-
Creates a URL by parsing the given spec with the specified handler within a specified context.

Sample Program:

// Java program to demonstrate working of URL 
import java.net.MalformedURLException; 
import java.net.URL; 
  
public class URLclass1 
{ 
    public static void main(String[] args) 
                  throws MalformedURLException 
    { 
  
        // creates a URL with string representation. 
        URL url1 = 
        new URL("https://www.google.co.in/?gfe_rd=cr&ei=ptYq" + 
                "WK26I4fT8gfth6CACg#q=geeks+for+geeks+java"); 
  
        // creates a URL with a protocol,hostname,and path 
        URL url2 = new URL("http", "www.geeksforgeeks.org", 
                         "/jvm-works-jvm-architecture/"); 
  
        URL url3 = new URL("https://www.google.co.in/search?"+ 
                           "q=gnu&rlz=1C1CHZL_enIN71" + 
                           "4IN715&oq=gnu&aqs=chrome..69i57j6" + 
                           "9i60l5.653j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF" + 
                           "-8#q=geeks+for+geeks+java"); 
  
        // print the String representation of the URL. 
        System.out.println(url1.toString()); 
        System.out.println(url2.toString()); 
        System.out.println(); 
        System.out.println("Different components of the URL3-"); 
  
        // retrieve the protocol for the URL 
        System.out.println("Protocol:- " + url3.getProtocol()); 
  
        // retrieve the hostname of the url 
        System.out.println("Hostname:- " + url3.getHost()); 
  
        // retrieve the defalut port 
        System.out.println("Default port:- " + 
                                        url3.getDefaultPort()); 
  
        // retrieve the query part of URL 
        System.out.println("Query:- " + url3.getQuery()); 
  
        // retrive the path of URL 
        System.out.println("Path:- " + url3.getPath()); 
  
        // retrive the file name 
        System.out.println("File:- " + url3.getFile()); 
  
        // retrieve the reference 
        System.out.println("Reference:- " + url3.getRef()); 
    } 
} 

/div>

Output:

https://www.google.co.in/?gfe_rd=cr&ei=ptYqWK26I4fT8gfth6CACg#q=geeks+for+geeks+java
https://tutorialspoint.dev/slugresolver/jvm-works-jvm-architecture/

Different components of the URL3-
Protocol:- https
Hostname:- www.google.co.in
Default port:- 443
Query:- q=gnu&rlz=1C1CHZL_enIN714IN715&oq=gnu&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60l5.653j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Path:- /search
File:- /search?q=gnu&rlz=1C1CHZL_enIN714IN715&oq=gnu&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60l5.653j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Reference:- q=geeks+for+geeks+java

Explanation of some methods used in above program are as follows:-

public String toString(): As in any class, toString() returns the string representation of the given URL object.
public String getAuthority(): returns the authority part of URL or null if empty.
public String getPath(): returns the path of the URL, or null if empty.
public String getQuery(): returns the query part of URL. Query is the the part after the ‘?’ in the URL. Whenever logic is used to display the result, there would be a query field in URL. It is similar to querying a database.
public String getHost(): return the hostname of the URL in IPv6 format.
public String getFile(): returns the file name.
public String getRef(): Returns the reference of the URL object. Usually the reference is the part marked by a ‘#’ in the URL. You can see the working exaple by querying anything on google and seeing the part after ‘#’.
public int getPort(): returns the port associated with the protocol specified by the URL.
public int getDefaultPort: returns the default port used.
public String getProtocol(): returns the protocol used by the URL.

References
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/net/URL.html#getAuthority()

Please write comments if you find anything incorrect, or you want to share more information about the topic discussed above.

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