I was wondering if someone here could try and help me with something. I have a programming project that requires me to input a text file, determine what kind of record it is ( such as add or ship ) then store the data types in an object. I have a couple problems that i run into.
If the line starts with A 7 different data types need to be constructed in an add class
If the line starts with S 4 integers need to be sent to the Ship class constructor

a typical line for add in the input file would be as follows: A 9999 C 2.3 2 0 1 3
and for ship : S 1 0 2 4
in the main i initiate a loop so i can read in using bufferedreadline

public class InputMain
{
public static void main(String[] args)
throws IOException
{

BufferedReader console = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(System.in));
String lastline = "";
char addA = "a";
boolean done = false;

while(!done)
{
String input = console.readline();
char ch = Character.toLowerCase(s.CharAt(0));
//checks first letter

if ( input == null)
done = true;

//i am not sure of the syntax to fine out what the record is
else if ( input.indexOf(ch) == addA )

//also i dont understand how to break up the full string into parts using substring
//i assume i should pass all as strings and parse them in a method of add
Add Adding = new Add( int , char , double , int , int , int , int);

else
Ship Shipping = new Ship(int , int , int , int );
//ends snip of code

what i dont understand isexactly how to compare the first charactar of the string and how to break it up into multiple strings using a space a the divider.

The examples in my book are not clear on this and have maybe devoted a half of a page to the subject. I've done a couple of searches and have come up empty. Any help would be appreciated.