What’s the difference between next() and nextLine() methods from Scanner class?

I always prefer to read input using nextLine() and then parse the string.

Using next() will only return what comes before the delimiter (defaults to whitespace). nextLine() automatically moves the scanner down after returning the current line.

A useful tool for parsing data from nextLine() would be str.split("\\s+").

String data = scanner.nextLine();
String[] pieces = data.split("\\s+");
// Parse the pieces

For more information regarding the Scanner class or String class refer to the following links.

Scanner: http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/util/Scanner.html

String: http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/lang/String.html

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