The following is the most direct way of converting a File to a String in Java. The String will have the platform default encoding. The code is HERE

import java.io.*;

public class F2S {
    /**
     * Description of the Method
     *
     * @param file
     *          The file to be turned into a String
     * @return  The file as String encoded in the platform
     * default encoding
     */
    public static String fileToString(String file) {
        String result = null;
        DataInputStream in = null;

        try {
            File f = new File(file);
            byte[] buffer = new byte[(int) f.length()];
            in = new DataInputStream(new FileInputStream(f));
            in.readFully(buffer);
            result = new String(buffer);
        } catch (IOException e) {
            throw new RuntimeException("IO problem in fileToString", e);
        } finally {
            try {
                in.close();
            } catch (IOException e) { /* ignore it */
            }
        }
        return result;
    }

}