Is this correctly writing to a text file?

Question

I am trying to save the integers in an array to a text file. Neither of these seem to be doing the trick while sitting in my main method and I was wondering if someone could point out my mistake.

public static void main (String[] params) throws IOException
{ 
   numberPlayers();
   int diceroll = dicethrow(6);
   int[] scorep1 = scorearrayp1();
   questions(diceroll, scorep1);
   sort(scorep1);

   File file = new File ("C:/Users/Usman/Desktop/directory/scores.txt");
   PrintWriter writer = new PrintWriter("scores.txt");
   writer.println("Player 1 score: " + scorep1[0]);
   writer.println("Player 2 score: " + scorep1[1]);
   writer.println("Player 3 score: " + scorep1[2]);
   writer.println("Player 4 score: " + scorep1[3]);
   writer.close();

   System.exit(0);
}

No score.txt file is created on my desktop in either of these attempts.

public static void main (String[] params) throws IOException
{ 
   numberPlayers();
   int diceroll = dicethrow(6);
   int[] scorep1 = scorearrayp1();
   questions(diceroll, scorep1);
   sort(scorep1);

   File file = new File("C:/Users/Me/Desktop/file.txt");
   PrintWriter printWriter = null;
   try
   {
      printWriter = new PrintWriter(file);
      printWriter.println("hello");
   }
   catch (FileNotFoundException e)
   {
      e.printStackTrace();
   }
   finally
   {
     if ( printWriter != null ) 
     {
        printWriter.close();
     }
   }

   System.exit(0);
}

EDIT: This is what I have made of the answers so far, please feel free to edit the wrong bit so I can clearly see what I've missed.

System.out.println("What's happening");
   String path = System.getProperty("user.home") + File.separator + "Desktop/file1.txt";
   File file = new File(path);

   PrintWriter printWriter = null;
   try
   {
      printWriter = new PrintWriter(file);
      printWriter.println("hello");
      FileWriter fileWriter = new FileWriter(file);
   }
   catch (FileNotFoundException e)
   {
      e.printStackTrace();
   }
   finally
   {
     if ( printWriter != null ) 
     {
        printWriter.close();
     }
   }

Also what about this:

PrintWriter writer = new PrintWriter("the-file-name.txt", "UTF-8");
writer.println("The first line");
writer.println("The second line");
writer.close();

Answer 1

Because File object does not create a physical copy of a file. For details follow this link
Does creating a File object create a physical file or touch anything outside the JVM?

Now if we come to your solution then first make a empty file on the disk by following command

     import java.io.*;

public class Test {
    public static void main(String [] args) {

        // The name of the file to open.
        String fileName = "C:\\Users\\MOSSAD\\Desktop\\new\\temp.txt";

        try {
            // Assume default encoding.
            FileWriter fileWriter =
                new FileWriter(fileName);

            File file = new File (fileName);
   PrintWriter writer = new PrintWriter(file);
   writer.println("Player 1 score: " + 5);
   writer.println("Player 2 score: " + 2);
   writer.println("Player 3 score: " + 3);
   writer.println("Player 4 score: " + 4);
   writer.close();
        }
        catch(IOException ex) {
            System.out.println(
                "Error writing to file '"
                + fileName + "'");
            // Or we could just do this:
            // ex.printStackTrace();
        }
    }
}

you need to use double slash in path .link

Answer 2

Rather a problem of directory

see this: How to use PrintWriter and File classes in Java?

If the directory doesn't exist you need to create it. Java won't create it by itself since the File class is just a link to an entity that can also not exist at all.

 // NOK for C:/Users   see below
 // File file = new File("C:/Users/Me/Desktop/file.txt");
 File file = new File("C:/classical_dir/file.txt");
 file.getParentFile().mkdirs();

 PrintWriter printWriter = new PrintWriter(file);

This works well on my pc:

 File file = new File("C:/foo/bar/blurps/file.txt");

This throws an exception: windows seems not to want it

 File file = new File("C:/Users/Me/Desktop/file.txt");

because, C:/Users/Me seems to be prohibited: C:/Users seems to be protected by system

see this for writing in User directory: how can I create a file in the current user's home directory using Java?

    String path = System.getProperty("user.home") + File.separator + "Desktop/file1.txt";
    File file = new File(path);

see this also: How to get the Desktop path in java