Using FTPClient How do you add the directory names to an ArrayList<String>()? - ftp-client

Question

I want to:
In Java on Netbeans:
Create a program that lists names of all files on an ftp site. Then check on a regular basis whether anything has been updated and produce a new list.
My thought process is:
return Files and directories in root via ftp connection FTPClient() ftp.listFiles(dir) (name and last modified date)
If file add to fileArray
2.1 If file exists in fileArray compare dates
2.2 if scanned file date newer than old file in fileArray replace
2.22 else update scanned date to fileArray
2.11 Else add
If Directory add to dirArray
3.11 If scanned directory exists in dirArray compare last date modified
3.21 If scanned directory date is newer than old directory date in dirArray replace in arraylist
3.22 Else remove
3.12 Else add directory to arraylist
Loop through dirArray grabbing the name and inputting it into dir and adding +1 to counter
run through from step 1 again until counter is > directory arraylist length;
Remove any files from file arraylist that are older than the scanDate
7.1 Loop though fileArray
7.2 compare returned file Date with scanDate
7.21 If scanned date != scanDate remove file.
List files in fileArray
Here is my code so far:
public class DanLister {
private Date scannedDate;
private String dir;
private ArrayList<String> dirArray = new ArrayList<String>();
private ArrayList<String> fileArray = new ArrayList<String>();
public void listFTP(String FTPdirectoryName,String server, String un, String pw, String dir, Calendar start, Calendar end){
try {
/// Instantiate new FTP Client
FTPClient ftp = new FTPClient();
/// Connect to FTP
ftp.connect(server);
ftp.login(un, pw);
System.out.println("Connected to " + server + "!");
System.out.println(ftp.getReplyString());
FTPFile[] filelist = ftp.listFiles(dir);
System.out.println(Arrays.toString(filelist));
ftp.logout();
ftp.disconnect();
} catch (IOException ex) {
Logger.getLogger(FTPListFiles.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE,
null, ex);
}
}
}
My problem is this returns FTPFile[] which won't go into my dirArray I'm unsure how to proceed with this part? I don't know how to convert the FTPFile[] or just grab the name and date and put it into the dirArray?

Answer 1

Solved with FTPListParseEngine
I've created this class:
package com.tableview.ftpmonitor;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import org.apache.commons.net.ftp.FTPFile;
import org.apache.commons.net.ftp.FTPFileEntryParser;
import org.apache.commons.net.ftp.FTPListParseEngine;
public class parseFileList {
private String encoding;
public FTPFile[] parseFileList(InputStream listStream) throws
IOException {
FTPListParseEngine engine = new
FTPListParseEngine((FTPFileEntryParser) this);
engine.readServerList(listStream, encoding);
return engine.getFiles();
}
}
And used this code to put file details in ArrayList:
public void listFTP(String FTPdirectoryName,String server, String un, String pw, String dir, Calendar start, Calendar end){
try {
/// Instantiate new FTP Client
FTPClient ftp = new FTPClient();
FTPFile ftpFile = new FTPFile();
parseFileList pfl = new parseFileList();
/// Connect to FTP
ftp.connect(server);
ftp.login(un, pw);
System.out.println("Connected to " + server + "!");
System.out.println(ftp.getReplyString());
FTPListParseEngine engine = ftp.initiateListParsing(dir);
int files = engine.getFiles().length;
System.out.println("This is number of files:" + files);
if(engine.hasNext()){
String ln = Arrays.toString(engine.getFiles());
dirArray.add(ln);
System.out.println(dirArray);
}