How to terminate a Java while loop using a string?

import java.util.*;
public class Loopy
{
static Scanner console = new Scanner(System.in);
public static void main(String[] args)
{
String str = "ok";
String output;
while (str != "done")
{
System.out.print ("Enter a word: ");
str = console.next();
System.out.print ("Your word is: " + str);
}
System.out.print ("You input done.");
}
}


When the user inputs done it stays in the loop, any ideas?

Your while condition will always evaluate to true. The expression

str != "done"

asks whether the reference str is different from the reference "done" - that is, do these items occupy different memory addresses? For String, == always compares by reference, not by value. For compare-by-value, which is your intent for your while condition, you should replace

str != "done"

with

!"done".equals(str)

or

!str.equals("done")

You could try using the String.equalsIgnoreCase() or String.compareTo() methods.

!= and == don't work the way you'd expect with String. You need String.equals() or String.equalsIgnoreCase().

the problem is that you are not using object comparision. != will work only for primitives.

Try replace the while condition with

while(! ("done").equals(str))