Java™ How To Program (Early Objects), Tenth Edition

Absolute vs. Relative Paths

A file or directory’s path specifies its location on disk. The path includes some or all of the directories leading to the file or directory. An absolute path contains all directories, starting with the root directory, that lead to a specific file or directory. Every file or directory on a particular disk drive has the same root directory in its path. A relative path is “relative” to another directory—for example, a path relative to the directory in which the application began executing.