Matt B的解决方案错误地获得了回溯目录的数量——它应该是基本路径的长度减去公共路径元素的数量，减去1(对于最后一个路径元素，它是一个文件名或由split生成的尾随“”)。它恰好适用于/a/b/c/和/a/x/y/，但是将参数替换为/m/n/o/a/b/c/和/m/n/o/a/x/y/，你就会发现问题。

此外，它还需要在第一个for循环中进行else中断，否则它将错误地处理碰巧具有匹配目录名的路径，例如/a/b/c/d/和/x/y/c/z——c在两个数组中的同一个槽中，但不是真正的匹配。

所有这些解决方案都缺乏处理不能相互相对化的路径的能力，因为它们具有不兼容的根，例如C:\foo\bar和D:\baz\quux。可能只是Windows上的一个问题，但值得注意。

我花在这上面的时间比我预期的要长得多，但没关系。我实际上需要这个工作，所以感谢每个人的插话，我相信这个版本也会有修正!

public static String getRelativePath(String targetPath, String basePath, 
        String pathSeparator) {

    //  We need the -1 argument to split to make sure we get a trailing 
    //  "" token if the base ends in the path separator and is therefore
    //  a directory. We require directory paths to end in the path
    //  separator -- otherwise they are indistinguishable from files.
    String[] base = basePath.split(Pattern.quote(pathSeparator), -1);
    String[] target = targetPath.split(Pattern.quote(pathSeparator), 0);

    //  First get all the common elements. Store them as a string,
    //  and also count how many of them there are. 
    String common = "";
    int commonIndex = 0;
    for (int i = 0; i < target.length && i < base.length; i++) {
        if (target[i].equals(base[i])) {
            common += target[i] + pathSeparator;
            commonIndex++;
        }
        else break;
    }

    if (commonIndex == 0)
    {
        //  Whoops -- not even a single common path element. This most
        //  likely indicates differing drive letters, like C: and D:. 
        //  These paths cannot be relativized. Return the target path.
        return targetPath;
        //  This should never happen when all absolute paths
        //  begin with / as in *nix. 
    }

    String relative = "";
    if (base.length == commonIndex) {
        //  Comment this out if you prefer that a relative path not start with ./
        //relative = "." + pathSeparator;
    }
    else {
        int numDirsUp = base.length - commonIndex - 1;
        //  The number of directories we have to backtrack is the length of 
        //  the base path MINUS the number of common path elements, minus
        //  one because the last element in the path isn't a directory.
        for (int i = 1; i <= (numDirsUp); i++) {
            relative += ".." + pathSeparator;
        }
    }
    relative += targetPath.substring(common.length());

    return relative;
}

下面是几种情况下的测试:

public void testGetRelativePathsUnixy() 
{        
    assertEquals("stuff/xyz.dat", FileUtils.getRelativePath(
            "/var/data/stuff/xyz.dat", "/var/data/", "/"));
    assertEquals("../../b/c", FileUtils.getRelativePath(
            "/a/b/c", "/a/x/y/", "/"));
    assertEquals("../../b/c", FileUtils.getRelativePath(
            "/m/n/o/a/b/c", "/m/n/o/a/x/y/", "/"));
}

public void testGetRelativePathFileToFile() 
{
    String target = "C:\\Windows\\Boot\\Fonts\\chs_boot.ttf";
    String base = "C:\\Windows\\Speech\\Common\\sapisvr.exe";

    String relPath = FileUtils.getRelativePath(target, base, "\\");
    assertEquals("..\\..\\..\\Boot\\Fonts\\chs_boot.ttf", relPath);
}

public void testGetRelativePathDirectoryToFile() 
{
    String target = "C:\\Windows\\Boot\\Fonts\\chs_boot.ttf";
    String base = "C:\\Windows\\Speech\\Common";

    String relPath = FileUtils.getRelativePath(target, base, "\\");
    assertEquals("..\\..\\Boot\\Fonts\\chs_boot.ttf", relPath);
}

public void testGetRelativePathDifferentDriveLetters() 
{
    String target = "D:\\sources\\recovery\\RecEnv.exe";
    String base   = "C:\\Java\\workspace\\AcceptanceTests\\Standard test data\\geo\\";

    //  Should just return the target path because of the incompatible roots.
    String relPath = FileUtils.getRelativePath(target, base, "\\");
    assertEquals(target, relPath);
}

在撰写本文时(2010年6月)，这是唯一通过我的测试用例的解决方案。我不能保证这个解决方案没有错误，但是它确实通过了包含的测试用例。我所编写的方法和测试依赖于Apache公共IO中的FilenameUtils类。

该解决方案使用Java 1.4进行了测试。如果你正在使用Java 1.5(或更高版本)，你应该考虑用StringBuilder代替StringBuffer(如果你还在使用Java 1.4，你应该考虑换一个雇主)。

import java.io.File;
import java.util.regex.Pattern;

import org.apache.commons.io.FilenameUtils;

public class ResourceUtils {

    /**
     * Get the relative path from one file to another, specifying the directory separator. 
     * If one of the provided resources does not exist, it is assumed to be a file unless it ends with '/' or
     * '\'.
     * 
     * @param targetPath targetPath is calculated to this file
     * @param basePath basePath is calculated from this file
     * @param pathSeparator directory separator. The platform default is not assumed so that we can test Unix behaviour when running on Windows (for example)
     * @return
     */
    public static String getRelativePath(String targetPath, String basePath, String pathSeparator) {

        // Normalize the paths
        String normalizedTargetPath = FilenameUtils.normalizeNoEndSeparator(targetPath);
        String normalizedBasePath = FilenameUtils.normalizeNoEndSeparator(basePath);

        // Undo the changes to the separators made by normalization
        if (pathSeparator.equals("/")) {
            normalizedTargetPath = FilenameUtils.separatorsToUnix(normalizedTargetPath);
            normalizedBasePath = FilenameUtils.separatorsToUnix(normalizedBasePath);

        } else if (pathSeparator.equals("\\")) {
            normalizedTargetPath = FilenameUtils.separatorsToWindows(normalizedTargetPath);
            normalizedBasePath = FilenameUtils.separatorsToWindows(normalizedBasePath);

        } else {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Unrecognised dir separator '" + pathSeparator + "'");
        }

        String[] base = normalizedBasePath.split(Pattern.quote(pathSeparator));
        String[] target = normalizedTargetPath.split(Pattern.quote(pathSeparator));

        // First get all the common elements. Store them as a string,
        // and also count how many of them there are.
        StringBuffer common = new StringBuffer();

        int commonIndex = 0;
        while (commonIndex < target.length && commonIndex < base.length
                && target[commonIndex].equals(base[commonIndex])) {
            common.append(target[commonIndex] + pathSeparator);
            commonIndex++;
        }

        if (commonIndex == 0) {
            // No single common path element. This most
            // likely indicates differing drive letters, like C: and D:.
            // These paths cannot be relativized.
            throw new PathResolutionException("No common path element found for '" + normalizedTargetPath + "' and '" + normalizedBasePath
                    + "'");
        }   

        // The number of directories we have to backtrack depends on whether the base is a file or a dir
        // For example, the relative path from
        //
        // /foo/bar/baz/gg/ff to /foo/bar/baz
        // 
        // ".." if ff is a file
        // "../.." if ff is a directory
        //
        // The following is a heuristic to figure out if the base refers to a file or dir. It's not perfect, because
        // the resource referred to by this path may not actually exist, but it's the best I can do
        boolean baseIsFile = true;

        File baseResource = new File(normalizedBasePath);

        if (baseResource.exists()) {
            baseIsFile = baseResource.isFile();

        } else if (basePath.endsWith(pathSeparator)) {
            baseIsFile = false;
        }

        StringBuffer relative = new StringBuffer();

        if (base.length != commonIndex) {
            int numDirsUp = baseIsFile ? base.length - commonIndex - 1 : base.length - commonIndex;

            for (int i = 0; i < numDirsUp; i++) {
                relative.append(".." + pathSeparator);
            }
        }
        relative.append(normalizedTargetPath.substring(common.length()));
        return relative.toString();
    }


    static class PathResolutionException extends RuntimeException {
        PathResolutionException(String msg) {
            super(msg);
        }
    }    
}

这个通过的测试用例是

public void testGetRelativePathsUnix() {
    assertEquals("stuff/xyz.dat", ResourceUtils.getRelativePath("/var/data/stuff/xyz.dat", "/var/data/", "/"));
    assertEquals("../../b/c", ResourceUtils.getRelativePath("/a/b/c", "/a/x/y/", "/"));
    assertEquals("../../b/c", ResourceUtils.getRelativePath("/m/n/o/a/b/c", "/m/n/o/a/x/y/", "/"));
}

public void testGetRelativePathFileToFile() {
    String target = "C:\\Windows\\Boot\\Fonts\\chs_boot.ttf";
    String base = "C:\\Windows\\Speech\\Common\\sapisvr.exe";

    String relPath = ResourceUtils.getRelativePath(target, base, "\\");
    assertEquals("..\\..\\Boot\\Fonts\\chs_boot.ttf", relPath);
}

public void testGetRelativePathDirectoryToFile() {
    String target = "C:\\Windows\\Boot\\Fonts\\chs_boot.ttf";
    String base = "C:\\Windows\\Speech\\Common\\";

    String relPath = ResourceUtils.getRelativePath(target, base, "\\");
    assertEquals("..\\..\\Boot\\Fonts\\chs_boot.ttf", relPath);
}

public void testGetRelativePathFileToDirectory() {
    String target = "C:\\Windows\\Boot\\Fonts";
    String base = "C:\\Windows\\Speech\\Common\\foo.txt";

    String relPath = ResourceUtils.getRelativePath(target, base, "\\");
    assertEquals("..\\..\\Boot\\Fonts", relPath);
}

public void testGetRelativePathDirectoryToDirectory() {
    String target = "C:\\Windows\\Boot\\";
    String base = "C:\\Windows\\Speech\\Common\\";
    String expected = "..\\..\\Boot";

    String relPath = ResourceUtils.getRelativePath(target, base, "\\");
    assertEquals(expected, relPath);
}

public void testGetRelativePathDifferentDriveLetters() {
    String target = "D:\\sources\\recovery\\RecEnv.exe";
    String base = "C:\\Java\\workspace\\AcceptanceTests\\Standard test data\\geo\\";

    try {
        ResourceUtils.getRelativePath(target, base, "\\");
        fail();

    } catch (PathResolutionException ex) {
        // expected exception
    }
}

如果路径在JRE 1.5运行时或maven插件中不可用

package org.afc.util;

import java.io.File;
import java.util.LinkedList;
import java.util.List;

public class FileUtil {

    public static String getRelativePath(String basePath, String filePath)  {
        return getRelativePath(new File(basePath), new File(filePath));
    }

    public static String getRelativePath(File base, File file)  {

        List<String> bases = new LinkedList<String>();
        bases.add(0, base.getName());
        for (File parent = base.getParentFile(); parent != null; parent = parent.getParentFile()) {
            bases.add(0, parent.getName());
        }

        List<String> files = new LinkedList<String>();
        files.add(0, file.getName());
        for (File parent = file.getParentFile(); parent != null; parent = parent.getParentFile()) {
            files.add(0, parent.getName());
        }

        int overlapIndex = 0;
        while (overlapIndex < bases.size() && overlapIndex < files.size() && bases.get(overlapIndex).equals(files.get(overlapIndex))) {
            overlapIndex++;
        }

        StringBuilder relativePath = new StringBuilder();
        for (int i = overlapIndex; i < bases.size(); i++) {
            relativePath.append("..").append(File.separatorChar);
        }

        for (int i = overlapIndex; i < files.size(); i++) {
            relativePath.append(files.get(i)).append(File.separatorChar);
        }

        relativePath.deleteCharAt(relativePath.length() - 1);
        return relativePath.toString();
    }

}

如果你知道第二个字符串是第一个字符串的一部分:

String s1 = "/var/data/stuff/xyz.dat";
String s2 = "/var/data";
String s3 = s1.substring(s2.length());

或者，如果你真的想把句号放在开头，就像你的例子中那样:

String s3 = ".".concat(s1.substring(s2.length()));

这里有一个其他库免费的解决方案:

Path sourceFile = Paths.get("some/common/path/example/a/b/c/f1.txt");
Path targetFile = Paths.get("some/common/path/example/d/e/f2.txt"); 
Path relativePath = sourceFile.relativize(targetFile);
System.out.println(relativePath);

输出

..\..\..\..\d\e\f2.txt

[编辑]实际上它输出更多。因为源文件不是目录。对于我的情况，正确的解决方案是:

Path sourceFile = Paths.get(new File("some/common/path/example/a/b/c/f1.txt").parent());
Path targetFile = Paths.get("some/common/path/example/d/e/f2.txt"); 
Path relativePath = sourceFile.relativize(targetFile);
System.out.println(relativePath);

我的版本大致基于马特和史蒂夫的版本:

/**
 * Returns the path of one File relative to another.
 *
 * @param target the target directory
 * @param base the base directory
 * @return target's path relative to the base directory
 * @throws IOException if an error occurs while resolving the files' canonical names
 */
 public static File getRelativeFile(File target, File base) throws IOException
 {
   String[] baseComponents = base.getCanonicalPath().split(Pattern.quote(File.separator));
   String[] targetComponents = target.getCanonicalPath().split(Pattern.quote(File.separator));

   // skip common components
   int index = 0;
   for (; index < targetComponents.length && index < baseComponents.length; ++index)
   {
     if (!targetComponents[index].equals(baseComponents[index]))
       break;
   }

   StringBuilder result = new StringBuilder();
   if (index != baseComponents.length)
   {
     // backtrack to base directory
     for (int i = index; i < baseComponents.length; ++i)
       result.append(".." + File.separator);
   }
   for (; index < targetComponents.length; ++index)
     result.append(targetComponents[index] + File.separator);
   if (!target.getPath().endsWith("/") && !target.getPath().endsWith("\\"))
   {
     // remove final path separator
     result.delete(result.length() - File.separator.length(), result.length());
   }
   return new File(result.toString());
 }