Extract parameter from URL String

The code below is shows how to extract a parameter from a URL string. This is useful when you need to extract a parameter value from the HTTP referrer string, which itself is a parameter of the HttpServletRequest object.

String searchTerm = null;

String urlString = "http://www.somewebaddress.co.uk/?test=blah+blah+blah&Test2=stuff";

URL url;

try {

url = new URL(urlString);

String queryString = url.getQuery();

//Check for single or multiple params

String[] params = (queryString.split("&").length > 0) ? queryString.split("&"): new String[]{queryString};

for(String param : params){

String[] paramNameValuePair = param.split("=");

if(paramNameValuePair[0].equals("test")){

searchTerm = paramNameValuePair[1];

System.out.println(searchTerm);

}

}

} catch (MalformedURLException e) {

System.out.println("Invalid URL!!");

}