LibGDX isDirectory() returns false even though it is a directory

Question

I am currently trying to get a list of files in a directory. When I try to get the filehandle for the directory it says that it is a file, but it isn't. When I then readString() from it, it returns the filenames of the files in it. This only happens in the IDE (Eclipse NEON.2), but when I export to JAR it crashes when I try to run.

How can I get LibGDX to recognise it as a directory and get all files in that directory. One last thing I have seen many anwers saying that list() doesn't work on desktop, but I have also read that it works. Can someone check if this is true or not.

public void loadEnemyBaseTypes(){
    ArrayList<FileHandle> enemyBaseFiles = new ArrayList<FileHandle>();
    FileHandle enemyBaseDirectory = 
        Gdx.files.internal("prototypes/enemybases");

    System.out.println(enemyBaseDirectory.exists());
    System.out.println(enemyBaseDirectory.isDirectory());

    String[] fileNames = enemyBaseDirectory.readString().split("\n");   

    for(int i = 0; i < fileNames.length; i++) 
        System.out.println(fileNames[i]);   
}

IDE Output :

true
false
base_0.enybse
base_1.enybse
base_2.enybse
base_3.enybse
base_4.enybse
base_5.enybse

Terminal Output :

true
false
Exception in thread "LWJGL Application" java.lang.NullPointerException
at java.io.FilterInputStream.read(Unknown Source)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamDecoder.readBytes(Unknown Source)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamDecoder.implRead(Unknown Source)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamDecoder.read(Unknown Source)
at java.io.InputStreamReader.read(Unknown Source)
at java.io.Reader.read(Unknown Source)
at com.badlogic.gdx.files.FileHandle.readString(FileHandle.java:207)
at com.badlogic.gdx.files.FileHandle.readString(FileHandle.java:191)
at dev.thomaslienbacher.simplegame.controllers.EnemyManager.loadEnemyBaseTypes(EnemyManager.java:53)
at dev.thomaslienbacher.simplegame.controllers.EnemyManager.loadAssets(EnemyManager.java:33)
at dev.thomaslienbacher.simplegame.scene.GameScene.loadAssets(GameScene.java:62)
at dev.thomaslienbacher.simplegame.Game.update(Game.java:149)
at dev.thomaslienbacher.simplegame.Game.render(Game.java:134)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl.LwjglApplication.mainLoop(LwjglApplication.java:223)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl.LwjglApplication$1.run(LwjglApplication.java:124)

Answer 1

I created nested folder inside Assets list -> enemy then I keep three .png files inside enemy folder having name 1.png , 2.png and 3.png .

FileHandle enemyBaseDirectory = Gdx.files.internal("list/enemy");

System.out.println(enemyBaseDirectory.exists());
System.out.println(enemyBaseDirectory.isDirectory());

FileHandle allList[]=enemyBaseDirectory.list();

for (FileHandle fileHandle:allList)
    System.out.println(fileHandle);

Output on IDE Run tab :

true
true
list/enemy/1.png
list/enemy/2.png
list/enemy/3.png

There is no any output on IDE local Terminal . My IDE is Intellij IDEA , hopefully result should be same on other IDE.

That is my expected output.

FileHandle's readString() reads the entire file into a string using the platform's default charset and if file handle represents a directory, doesn't exist, or could not be read then throw GdxRuntimeException .