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Updated on 2025-04-14

SpringBoot Integration Apache Tika’s Specific Operations for Extracting Data

1 SpringBoot Integration of Apache Tika

1.1 Tika

1.1.1 Tika Features

Apache TikaIt is a powerful content analysis tool that can extract text, metadata, and other structured information from multiple file formats. Here are the main features of Apache Tika:

  • Multi-format support
    TikaOne of the biggest features of this is that it supports a wide range of file formats. It is capable of parsing and extracting content from a variety of document types, including but not limited to:
    • Office documents:Microsoft Word（.doc, .docx）、Excel（.xls, .xlsx）、PowerPoint（.ppt, .pptx）、OpenOffice（.odt, .ods)wait.
    • PDF: Extract text and metadata from PDF documents.
    • HTML / XML: parses HTML and XML format content.
    • Text files: such as .txt files, etc.
    • Pictures and audio and video: Supports image formats (such as JPEG, PNG) and audio and video formats (such as MP3, MP4, WAV, etc.), and can extract relevant metadata.
    • Email: For example, EML file format.
    • Compressed files: such as file contents in compressed packages such as ZIP, TAR, GZ, etc.
  • Automatic file type detection
    TikaIt has powerful automatic file type recognition function, and can determine the true type of a file based on the file content rather than the file extension. It supports automatic recognition of multiple standard and non-standard file types, ensuring high-accurate format recognition.
    MIMEType Identification:TikaIt can accurately identify filesMIMEType, helps the system determine how to process and parse files.
  • Text and metadata extraction
    TikaAbility to extract text content and metadata from a variety of files. Metadata usually includes author, creation date, modification date, file size, copyright information, etc.
    • Text extraction: Regardless of file format,TikaAll can extract text information.
    • Metadata extraction: In addition to text,TikaIt can also extract various metadata, such as author, title, keyword, modification time, etc., to facilitate further analysis or indexing.
  • Supports OCR (optical character recognition)
    TikaIntegratedOCREngines (such as Tesseract) can extract text information from images in scanned images or PDF documents. When an image is included in the file,TikaCan be passedOCRFunctions identify text in the image and extract it.
  • Language detection
    TikaIt has the function of automatically detecting file text language. By analyzing the extracted text,TikaThe language that can identify the document (such as English, Chinese, French, etc.), this function is very useful for multilingual processing and document classification.
  • Supports embedded applications
    TikaSoJavaIt is the main development language, and it can not only be used as a standalone application, but also embedded in other Java applications.TikaIt provides a Java API, allowing developers to easily integrate into various applications for automated file content extraction and processing.
    • Tika App: Command line tool for extracting content from files and outputting text and metadata.
    • Tika Server: A RESTful API-based service, suitable for interaction with external systems through the HTTP protocol, and supports remote file parsing.
  • Multithreaded support
    Apache TikaIt provides the ability to process in parallel, allowing the processing speed to be increased through multi-threading when processing large batches of files. For scenarios where batch file parsing and content extraction are required, Tika's multi-threading support can significantly improve efficiency.
  • Unified output of content and metadata format
    Tika returns a unified output format, regardless of file type, the extracted text and metadata will be provided in the standard way. This allows developers to easily process file contents in different formats.
    • JSON format output: Tika can output extracted content and metadata in JSON format, making it easy to integrate and process with other systems.
    • XML format output: In addition to JSON format, Tika also supports outputting content extraction results in XML format, suitable for scenarios where more structured data is required.
  • Supports large file processing
    TikaSupports processing of large documents and multi-page documents, and can efficiently extract content without consuming too much memory. Tika can provide reliable support for application scenarios that require processing large amounts of documents or large documents (such as search engines, big data processing, etc.).
  • Integration with other tools and libraries
    Tika can also integrate with other tools and libraries to extend its capabilities:
    • Lucene / Solr / Elasticsearch: Tika is often integrated with these search engines for full-text indexing and search.
    • Apache POI: Tika usesApache POITo parse Microsoft Office file formats (such as .docx, .xlsx, etc.).
    • PDFBox: Used to parse and extract PDF file content.
    • Tesseract OCR: Used to extract text from images, especially for scanning documents and image content.
  • Highly scalable
    TikaProvides a flexible expansion mechanism, where users can customize parsers according to their needs, add new file format support, or adjust text extraction strategies. By customizing Tika configuration files (e.g.), developers can configure the processing methods of different types of files, modify the default parser and behavior, etc.
    Apache TikaThe main features include support for multiple file formats, automatic file type detection, text and metadata extraction, OCR support, language detection, multi-threaded processing, unified format output, and seamless integration with other tools. These features make Tika a powerful and flexible content analysis framework, suitable for various application scenarios such as document management, information extraction, search engines, and big data processing.

1.1.2 Tika Architecture Components

Apache TikaThe architecture components mainly include the following core parts, which work together to support the extraction of text, metadata and other information from various file formats. Here are the main architectural components of Apache Tika:

  • Tika Core
    Tika CoreyesApache TikaThe core component of   provides the basic functions of file parsing and content extraction. It contains the most basic functions such as document type recognition, parsing and extracting text content. Tika Core is the foundation of other functions and modules.
    • File parsing (Parser): Used to parse various file formats and return extracted text and metadata.
    • Content extraction (Content Extraction): Extract content in the file, including text, pictures, audio, video, etc.
    • File type identification (MIME Type Detection): Determine the actual type of the file (such as PDF, Word, Excel, HTML, etc.) based on the content of the file instead of the extension.
  • Tika Parsers
    Tika ParsersIt is a group of components responsible for parsing different types of files. They are a key component of Tika’s core and can handle a variety of formats such as text documents, spreadsheets, PDFs, images, audio, and more. Tika automatically selects the appropriate parser based on the file type.
    • Text parser (Text Parsers): parsing ordinary text files (such as.txt、.xml、.htmlwait).
    • Multimedia parser (Media Parsers): Analyze multimedia files such as pictures, audio, and video.
    • Document parser (Document Parsers): Analyze various office documents, such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF, etc.
    • Metadata parser (Metadata Parsers): Extract metadata from the file, such as author, creation date, modification date, file size, etc.
  • Tika Config (Configuration Management)
    Tika ConfigIt is a module used to manage Tika configuration, allowing users to customize Tika's behavior through configuration files. Through Tika Config, users can specify specific parsers, extraction policies, character sets and other settings.
  • Configuration file: You can configure how to parse different types of files through files.
  • Custom parser and extensions: Users can customize their own parser and add it to the Tika system through configuration files.
  • Tika App
    Tika Appis a command line tool that provides an easy-to-use interface to invoke Tika core features.Tika AppIt can be run directly from the command line for file content extraction, text and metadata extraction. It can be used as a standalone application or embedded in other Java applications.
    • Command Line Interface (CLI): Provides a concise command line interface that allows users to process files from the command line.
    • File processing: Supports batch file processing, which can extract text, metadata and other information and output it to standard output or file.
  • Tika Server
    Tika ServerIt is based onRESTful APIThe server-side component that allows remote calls to the HTTP protocol.Tika ServerProvides a server-side interface for external applications, supporting file upload, content extraction and processing.
    • RESTful API: Interacting with Tika Server through HTTP requests allows you to upload files and obtain parsed content or metadata.
    • Remote parsing: Supports asynchronous processing of large files and batch files, suitable for integration with other systems (such as search engines, cloud storage services, etc.).
  • Tika Language Detection
    TikaIt also provides a built-in language detection function to automatically recognize the language that extracts text. Language detection is very useful for multilingual supported projects, helping to identify the language type of text after the file content is parsed, thereby deciding which processing method to use.
    • Language recognition: Automatically detect the language of the document (such as English, Chinese, French, etc.) based on text content.
    • Integrated support: Language detection function can be used in combination with text extraction, content analysis and other processes to improve the multilingual processing capabilities of content.
  • Tika Extractor
    Tika ExtractorIt is an abstract layer that provides a unified interface to extract the content of a file. It unifies different file parsers into one interface, simplifying the process of extracting file contents. Through Tika Extractor, users can perform unified operations between different file types without paying attention to specific parsing implementations.
    • Unified interface: Use a unified interface to process files in different formats to simplify the extraction process of file content.
    • Custom extensions: Allow developers to expand the extractor according to their needs, supporting more file formats or custom content extraction logic.
  • Tika Metadata
    Tika Metadatais a component used to manage file metadata. It extracts and provides various metadata of the file, such as author, creation time, modification time, copyright information, file size, etc. Tika supports extracting metadata from various file formats.
    • Metadata extraction: Extract additional information related to the file from various files, such as file attributes, authors, titles, etc.
    • Unified format: Returns standardized metadata structures for easy integration with other systems.
  • Tika OCR (Optical Character Recognition)
    TikaIntegrated OCR function, leveraging open sourceOCREngine (such asTesseract) to extract text information in the image. When a file contains a scanned image or photo, the OCR component can recognize text in the image and extract it.
    • Image text recognition: Extract text content from an image or scan the document.
    • Integration and Extensions: Can be combined with other parsers to automatically process files containing images or scanned documents.

1.1.3 Tika application scenarios

Apache TikaIt is an open source content analysis tool, mainly used to extract text, metadata and structured information from various file formats. It supports a variety of file formats, including documents, spreadsheets, PDFs, audio, videos, pictures, etc., and has powerful file content parsing capabilities. The application scenarios in real projects are very widespread. The following are some typical application scenarios:

  • Enterprise Document Management System
    In large enterprises or institutions, document management systems usually need to process a large number of files in different formats (such as PDF, Word, Excel, etc.).
    passApache Tika, you can automatically extract text and metadata (such as author, creation time, file size, etc.) from these files and then store them in a database for easy search, management, and indexing. This application enables enterprises to efficiently archive, search and classify documents.
    Sample application:
    • Automated document extraction: Extract key information in the file, such as terms in the contract, prices in the quotation, etc., to help employees quickly locate important data.
    • Full-text search function: The text content extracted by Tika can be indexed and provides fast full-text search function to facilitate users to find the required documents.
  • Content Management System (CMS)
    In the content management system,Apache TikaCan be used to automatically extract the content of uploaded files and convert them into an editable format. This is very useful for content management including various document formats (such as text, PDF, images, etc.), especially when a large number of files are required to be processed in websites and platforms. Tika can provide a unified processing interface.
    Sample application:
    • Website file processing: When a user uploads a file to a website, Tika automatically extracts the file content (such as extracting text from a document and metadata from an image) for further processing or storage.
    • File format conversion:TikaThe uploaded files can be converted into a unified format for easier subsequent editing and display.
  • Data analysis and big data platform
    In big data analysis,Apache TikaIt can be used to process unstructured data (such as text, PDF, pictures, audio files, etc.) and convert this data into structured data. passTikaThe extracted text can be further subject to analysis tasks such as data cleaning, classification, clustering or text mining.
    Sample application:
    • Big Data Processing: In a data lake or big data platform, Tika can help extract analysable text data from different sources (such as emails, documents, pictures, etc.) for machine learning model training, sentiment analysis, or trend prediction.
    • Search engines: In search engines, content parsing provided by Tika can support different types of file indexing and retrieval functions, enhancing the accuracy and comprehensiveness of search results.
  • Legal and compliance review
    In the field of law and compliance, companies often need to analyze a large number of contracts, legal documents, emails, etc. Apache Tika can help automatically extract key information from these documents, such as contract terms, payment details, legal provisions, etc. for review by attorneys and compliance personnel.
    Sample application:
    • Contract Review and Analysis: Tika can be used to extract important text information from the contract, such as signing date, amount, terms and content, etc., to help reviewers quickly identify the core content of the document.
    • Compliance Check: Automatically extract and classify compliance information in documents to help companies check compliance with regulations and reduce the workload of manual review.
  • Digital Asset Management (DAM)
    In digital asset management systems, Apache Tika is widely used to extract metadata and content of multimedia files (such as images, videos, audio files, etc.). Digital assets can be better managed and indexed by parsing metadata in tags in pictures, subtitles in videos, or audio files.
    Sample application:
    • Image and video content management: Tika can automatically extract metadata of pictures and videos (such as shooting time, camera type, resolution, etc.) and help build a digital media library to provide content-based search functions.
    • Automatic classification and tagging: Tika can automatically classify and tag through analyzing file content and metadata, helping businesses manage and access digital assets more efficiently.
  • Information security and data leakage protection
    In the field of information security,Apache TikaCan be used to scan sensitive data in files. For example, Tika can help companies detect whether sensitive personal information (such as ID number, credit card information, etc.) in their files, thereby enhancing their ability to protect against data breaches.
    Sample application:
    • Sensitive information identification: After extracting the file contents through Tika, automated sensitive data detection is carried out to identify files that may contain personal sensitive information or confidential data.
    • Data Breach Protection: In enterprise systems, Tika can assist in checking potential risks in file upload and sharing, ensuring that sensitive information is not accidentally leaked.
  • Automated email classification
    Apache Tika can also be used to extract content from emails to help automatically classify email content. In many businesses or organizations, Tika can be used to help identify attachments, links, or critical information in an email, which can be classified, archived, or automatically responded based on content.
    Sample application:
    • Email content extraction and classification: Tika can extract text from emails, analyze the subject, sender and body content of the email, help automate email classification and reduce manual operations.
    • Attachment Scan and Process: Tika can analyze attachments in emails and automatically execute appropriate handling procedures based on attachment type and content.
      Apache Tika has a wide range of applications in multiple fields and projects, especially for scenarios where data needs to be extracted and processed from files in various formats. Whether it is corporate document management, legal review, big data analysis, digital asset management, information security and other fields, Tika can help developers efficiently realize content parsing, data extraction and processing tasks through unified interfaces and powerful format support.

1.2 Tika realizes information security and data leakage protection

existSpring BootIntegrationApache TikaUsed for sensitive information identification and data leakage protection, we can extract file content when the file is uploaded and search for potential sensitive data in the extracted text, such as ID number, credit card information, telephone number, etc. Here is a complete code example showing how to implement sensitive information detection and data breach protection.

1.2.1

First, make sure you add Apache Tika and Spring Boot web dependencies in (Maven) or (Gradle).

Maven dependencies

<dependencies>
    <!-- Spring Boot Web -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId></groupId>
        <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-web</artifactId>
    </dependency>
    <!-- Apache Tika -->
    <dependency>
        <groupId></groupId>
        <artifactId>tika-core</artifactId>
        <version>2.6.0</version>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
        <groupId></groupId>
        <artifactId>tika-parsers</artifactId>
        <version>2.6.0</version>
    </dependency>
</dependencies>

1.2.2 Create sensitive information detection logic

The detection of sensitive information usually involves regular expressions (Regex), and you can use common patterns to detect personal information (such as ID number, credit card number, phone number, etc.). Create a service class that scans file content and detects this sensitive data.

package ;
import ;
import ;
import ;
import ;
import ;
import ;
import ;
import ;
@Service
public class SensitiveInfoService {
    private final Tika tika = new Tika();  // Tika instance    // Regular expression pattern: ID number, credit card number, phone number    private static final String ID_CARD_REGEX = "(\\d{17}[\\dXx]|\\d{15})";
    private static final String CREDIT_CARD_REGEX = "(\\d{4}-?\\d{4}-?\\d{4}-?\\d{4})";
    private static final String PHONE_REGEX = "(\\d{3}-?\\d{3}-?\\d{4})|((\\d{11})|(\\d{3})\\d{7})";
    // Extract file content and detect sensitive information    public String checkSensitiveInfo(InputStream fileInputStream) throws IOException {
        // 1. Use Tika to extract file contents        String fileContent = (fileInputStream);
        // 2. Perform sensitive information detection        StringBuilder sensitiveInfoDetected = new StringBuilder();
        // Check the ID number        detectAndAppend(fileContent, ID_CARD_REGEX, "Identity card number", sensitiveInfoDetected);
        // Check the credit card number        detectAndAppend(fileContent, CREDIT_CARD_REGEX, "Credit card number", sensitiveInfoDetected);
        // Check phone number        detectAndAppend(fileContent, PHONE_REGEX, "telephone number", sensitiveInfoDetected);
        return () &gt; 0 ? () : "No sensitive information detected";
    }
    // General detection method    private void detectAndAppend(String content, String regex, String label, StringBuilder result) {
        Pattern pattern = (regex);
        Matcher matcher = (content);
        while (()) {
            (label).append(": ").append(()).append("\n");
        }
    }
}
Expected return result：
ID number: 123456789012345678
Credit card number: 1234-5678-9876-5432
telephone number: 138-1234-5678

1.2.3 Create a file upload controller

Next, we will create a controller that accepts file upload requests through the REST API, extracts the file contents and detects whether it contains sensitive information. The process of file upload receives files through MultipartFile.

package ;
import ;
import ;
import .*;
import ;
import ;
@RestController
@RequestMapping("/api/files")
public class FileController {
    @Autowired
    private SensitiveInfoService sensitiveInfoService;
    @PostMapping("/upload")
    public String uploadFile(@RequestParam("file") MultipartFile file) {
        try {
            // Get the input stream of uploaded files            String result = (());
            return result;
        } catch (IOException e) {
            return "File processing error: " + ();
        }
    }
}

This is the end of this article about SpringBoot integrating Apache Tika data extraction. For more information about SpringBoot Apache Tika data extraction, please search for my previous articles or continue browsing the related articles below. I hope everyone will support me in the future!