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Message:

Clearing the Screen in Java

Posted by Matt Gerrans on December 03, 2001 at 2:42 PM

> Try this to clear a console screen:
> System.out.print("\ 033c");

That didn't work for me; with the space after the backslash, it doesn't compile, without, it only printed a left-pointing arrow and a 'c' (maybe some information was lost or changed in the post?). If it did work, are you assuming the ANSI.SYS driver is loaded for this?

Anyway, I like a little color, even in my DOS boxes, so I do it this way:

Runtime.getRuntime().exec("c:\\command.com /c be cls bright white on blue");

I would prefer to use the COMSPEC environment variable instead of hard-coding Command.com (or cmd.exe), but for some reason, java.lang.System.getenv() has been deprecated and java.lang.System.getProperty() is an incomplete replacement (I don't know what they were thinking with this properties stuff, but for some silly reason it doesn't contain all the environment).

- mfg

• it doesn't work for me Richard Martin February 12, 2002 at 7:13 PM (0)