BufferedReader input gives unexpected result

Question

When I run the following code and type 50 when prompted for input:

    private static int nPeople;

public static void main(String[] args) {

    nPeople = 0;
    System.out.println("Please enter the amount of people that will go onto the platform : ");
    BufferedReader keyboard = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(System.in));
    try {
        nPeople = keyboard.read();
    } catch (IOException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
    }

    System.out.println(" The number of people entered --> " + nPeople);
}

}

I get the following output:

Please enter the amount of people that will go onto the platform : 50 The number of people entered --> 53

Why is it returning 53 when I typed 50 ? Thanks.

Answer 1

BufferedReader#read() method reads a single character from your input.

So when you pass 50 as input, it just reads 5 and converts it to ASCII equivalent that is 53 to store it in int variable.

I think you need BufferedReader#readLine() method here, which reads a line of text.

try {
    nPeople = Integer.parseInt(keyboard.readLine());  
} catch (IOException e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
}

You need Integer.parseInt method to convert the string representation into an integer.