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How to prevent file wipe if an error occurs while writing to it?

This is an issue I have had in many applications.
I want to change the information inside a file, which has an outdated version.
In this instance, I am updating the file that records playlists after adding a song to a playlist. (For reference, I am creating an app for android.)
The problem is if I run this code:
FileOutputStream output = new FileOutputStream(file);
output.write(data.getBytes());
output.close();
And if an IOException occurs while trying to write to the file, the data is lost (since creating an instance of FileOutputStream empties the file). Is there a better method to do this, so if an IOException occurs, the old data remains intact? Or does this error only occur when the file is read-only, so I just need to check for that?
My only "work around" is to inform the user of the error, and give said user the correct data, which the user has to manually update. While this might work for a developer, there is a lot of issues that could occur if this happens. Additionally, in this case, the user doesn't have permission to edit the file themselves, so the "work around" doesn't work at all.
Sorry if someone else has asked this. I couldn't find a result when searching.
Thanks in advance!

One way you could ensure that you do not wipe the file is by creating a new file with a different name first. If writing that file succeeds, you could delete the old file and rename the new one.
There is the possibility that renaming fails. To be completely safe from that, your files could be named according to the time at which they are created. For instance, if your file is named save.dat, you could add the time at which the file was saved (from System.currentTimeMillis()) to the end of the file's name. Then, no matter what happens later (including failure to delete the old file or rename the new one), you can recover the most recent successful save. I have included a sample implementation below which represents the time as a 16-digit zero-padded hexadecimal number appended to the file extension. A file named save.dat will be instead saved as save.dat00000171ed431353 or something similar.
// name includes the file extension (i.e. "save.dat").
static File fileToSave(File directory, String name) {
return new File(directory, name + String.format("%016x", System.currentTimeMillis()));
}
// return the entire array if you need older versions for which deletion failed. This could be useful for attempting to purge any unnecessary older versions for instance.
static File fileToLoad(File directory, String name) {
File[] files = directory.listFiles((dir, n) -> n.startsWith(name));
Arrays.sort(files, Comparator.comparingLong((File file) -> Long.parseLong(file.getName().substring(name.length()), 16)).reversed());
return files[0];
}

android create text file on install

I need help storing data on my Android app. I need to create a text file, but only once. I have tried if(file.exists()) and if (file!=null) but nothing's working.I need this text file to store user data strings between app restarts. This code will create the file onCreate everytime, but I need it to only do it if the file doesnt already exist
private void createFile(String filename){
if(memoryFile != null){
memoryFile = new File(getApplicationContext().getFilesDir(), filename);
}
}

This code will create the file onCreate everytime
No, it will not. It will not create any file. It creates an instance of a File object. That is a Java object that represents a (possible) file on the filesystem. It does not actually create the file. To create the file, write something to it, using a FileOutputStream (and a background thread). To see if the file already exists, call exists() on memoryFile.
Also, note that you do not need getApplicationContext() here. Just use getFilesDir().

Android get file using path (in String format)

My app needs to get an existing file for processing. Now I have the path of the file in String format, how can I get the File with it? Is it correct to do this:
File fileToSave = new File(dirOfTheFile);
Here dirOfTheFile is the path of the file. If I implement it in this way, will I get the existing file or the system will create another file for me?

That's what you want to do. If the file exists you'll get it. Otherwise you'll create it. You can check whether the file exists by calling fileToSave.exists() on it and act appropriately if it does not.
The new keyword is creating a File object in code, not necessarily a new file on the device.
I would caution you to not use hardcoded paths if you are for dirOfFile. For example, if you're accessing external storage, call Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory() instead of hardcoding /sdcard.

The File object is just a reference to a file (a wrapper around the path of the file); creating a new File object does not actually create or read the file; to do that, use FileInputStream to read, FileOutputStream to write, or the various File helper methods (like exists(), createNewFile(), etc.) for example to actually perform operations on the path in question. Note that, as others have pointed out, you should use one of the utilities provided by the system to locate directories on the internal or external storage, depending on where you want your files.

try this..
File fileToSave = new File(dirOfTheFile);
if(fileToSave.exists())
{
// the file exists. use it
} else {
// create file here
}
if parent folder is not there you may have to call fileToSave.getParentFile().mkdirs() to create parent folders

Java copy-overwrite file, gets old file when reading

In a unit test I am overwriting a config file to test handling bad property values.
I am using Apache Commons IO:
org.apache.commons.io.FileUtils.copyFile(new File(configDir, "xyz.properties.badValue"), new File(configDir, "xyz.properties"), false)
When investigating the file system I can see that xyz.properties is in fact overwritten - size is updated and the content is the same as that of xyz.properties.badValue.
When I complete the test case which goes through code that reads the file into a Properties object (using a FileReader object) I get the properties of the original xyz.properties file, not the newly copied version.
Through debugging where I single step and investigate the file I can rule out it being a timing issue of writing to the file system.
Does the copy step somehow hold a file handle? If so how would I release it again?
If not, does anybody have any idea why this happens and how to resolve it?
Thanks.

If you initialized the FileReader object before this object, then it will have already stored a temp copy of the old version.
You'll need to reset it:
FileReader f = new FileReader("the.file");
// Copy and overwrite "the.file"
f = new FileReader("the.file");
In the Unix filesystem model, the inode containing the file's contents will persist as long as someone has an open filehandle into the file, or there is a directory entry pointing to it.
Replacing the file's name in the directory, does not remove the inode (contents of the file), so your already-open filehandle can continue to be used.
This is actually exploitable to create temporary files that never need to be cleaned up: create the file, then unlink it immediately, while keeping it open. When you close the file handle, the inode is reaped

I realize that this doesn't answer your question directly, but I think that it would be better to maintain two separate files, and arrange for your code to have the name of the configuration file configurable / injected at runtime. That way, your tests can specify which config file to use, rather than overwriting a single file.

Java: Efficient way to scan a folder for a particular file

I am contacting an external services with my Java app.
The flow is as follow: ->I generate an XML file, and put it in an folder, then the service processes the file and return another file with the same name having an extension .out
Right now after I put the file in the folder I start with a loop, until I get that file back so I can read the result.
Here is the code:
fileName += ".out";
File f = new File(fileName);
do
{
f = new File(fileName);
} while (!f.exists());
response = readResponse(fileName); // got the response now read it
My question comes here, am I doing it in the right way, is there a better/more efficient way to wait for the file?
Some info: I run my app on WinXP, usually it takes the external service less than a second to respond with a file, I send around 200 request per day to this services. The path to the folder with the result file is always the same.
All suggestions are welcome.
Thank you for your time.

There's no reason to recreate the File object. It just represents the file location, whether the file exists or not. Also you probably don't want a loop without at least a short delay, otherwise it'll just max out a processor until the file exists. You probably want something like this instead:
File file = new File(filename);
while (!file.exists()) {
Thread.sleep(100);
}
Edit: Ingo makes a great point in the comments. The file might not be completely there just because it exists. One way to guarantee that it's ready is have the first process create a second file after the first is completely written. Then have the Java program detect that second file, delete it and then safely read the first one.