我花了一点时间才想明白。 真正的关键是阅读Formatter文档。

// Get your data from wherever.
final byte[] data = getData();
// Get the digest engine.
final MessageDigest md5= MessageDigest.getInstance("MD5");
// Send your data through it.
md5.update(data);
// Parse the data as a positive BigInteger.
final BigInteger digest = new BigInteger(1,md5.digest());
// Pad the digest with blanks, 32 wide.
String hex = String.format(
    // See: http://download.oracle.com/javase/1.5.0/docs/api/java/util/Formatter.html
    // Format: %[argument_index$][flags][width]conversion
    // Conversion: 'x', 'X'  integral    The result is formatted as a hexadecimal integer
    "%1$32x",
    digest
);
// Replace the blank padding with 0s.
hex = hex.replace(" ","0");
System.out.println(hex);

为此编写自己的函数可能比其他答案更简单。

private static String padRight(String str, String padChar, int n) {

    String paddedString = str;

    while (paddedString.length() < n) {

        paddedString = padChar + str;

    }

    return paddedString;

}

private static String padLeft(String str, String padChar, int n) {

    String paddedString = str;

    while (paddedString.length() < n) {

        paddedString += padChar;

    }

    return paddedString;

}

这是一个高效的实用工具类，用于Java中的左填充，右填充，中心填充和零填充字符串。

package com.example;

/**
 * Utility class for left pad, right pad, center pad and zero fill.
 */
public final class StringPadding {

    public static String left(String string, int length, char fill) {

        if (string.length() < length) {

            char[] chars = string.toCharArray();
            char[] output = new char[length];

            int delta = length - chars.length;

            for (int i = 0; i < length; i++) {
                if (i < delta) {
                    output[i] = fill;
                } else {
                    output[i] = chars[i - delta];
                }
            }

            return new String(output);
        }

        return string;
    }

    public static String right(String string, int length, char fill) {

        if (string.length() < length) {

            char[] chars = string.toCharArray();
            char[] output = new char[length];

            for (int i = 0; i < length; i++) {
                if (i < chars.length) {
                    output[i] = chars[i];
                } else {
                    output[i] = fill;
                }
            }

            return new String(output);
        }

        return string;
    }

    public static String center(String string, int length, char fill) {

        if (string.length() < length) {

            char[] chars = string.toCharArray();

            int delta = length - chars.length;
            int a = (delta % 2 == 0) ? delta / 2 : delta / 2 + 1;
            int b = a + chars.length;

            char[] output = new char[length];
            for (int i = 0; i < length; i++) {
                if (i < a) {
                    output[i] = fill;
                } else if (i < b) {
                    output[i] = chars[i - a];
                } else {
                    output[i] = fill;
                }
            }

            return new String(output);
        }

        return string;
    }

    public static String zerofill(String string, int length) {
        return left(string, length, '0');
    }

    private StringPadding() {
    }

    /**
     * For tests!
     */
    public static void main(String[] args) {

        String string = "123";
        char blank = ' ';

        System.out.println("left pad:    [" + StringPadding.left(string, 10, blank) + "]");
        System.out.println("right pad:   [" + StringPadding.right(string, 10, blank) + "]");
        System.out.println("center pad:  [" + StringPadding.center(string, 10, blank) + "]");
        System.out.println("zero fill:   [" + StringPadding.zerofill(string, 10) + "]");
    }
}

输出如下:

left pad:    [       123]
right pad:   [123       ]
center pad:  [    123   ]
zero fill:   [0000000123]

Apache StringUtils有几个方法:leftPad, rightPad, center和repeat。

但是请注意，正如其他人在这个回答中提到和演示的那样，JDK中的String.format()和Formatter类是更好的选择。使用它们而不是公共代码。

让我给一些情况下的答案，你需要给左/右填充(或前缀/后缀字符串或空格)在你连接到另一个字符串之前，你不想测试长度或任何if条件。

与所选答案相同，我更喜欢Apache Commons的StringUtils，但使用这种方式:

StringUtils.defaultString(StringUtils.leftPad(myString, 1))

解释:

myString:我输入的字符串，可以为空 stringutil的。leftPad(myString, 1):如果string为空，此语句也将返回null 然后使用defaultString给出空字符串，以防止连接null

Java联机程序，没有花哨的库。

// 6 characters padding example
String pad = "******";
// testcases for 0, 4, 8 characters
String input = "" | "abcd" | "abcdefgh"

左Pad，不要限制

result = pad.substring(Math.min(input.length(),pad.length())) + input;
results: "******" | "**abcd" | "abcdefgh"

右移，不要限制

result = input + pad.substring(Math.min(input.length(),pad.length()));
results: "******" | "abcd**" | "abcdefgh"

左衬垫，限制衬垫长度

result = (pad + input).substring(input.length(), input.length() + pad.length());
results: "******" | "**abcd" | "cdefgh"

右垫，限制垫的长度

result = (input + pad).substring(0, pad.length());
results: "******" | "abcd**" | "abcdef"