diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..67b3b98
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
+*.class
+
+# Mobile Tools for Java (J2ME)
+.mtj.tmp/
+
+# Package Files #
+*.jar
+*.war
+*.ear
+
+# virtual machine crash logs, see http://www.java.com/en/download/help/error_hotspot.xml
+hs_err_pid*
+*~
diff --git a/Parser.java b/Parser.java
index d6d65d3..c42e397 100644
--- a/Parser.java
+++ b/Parser.java
@@ -2,26 +2,30 @@
 import java.io.FileInputStream;
 import java.io.FileOutputStream;
 import java.io.IOException;
+import java.io.PrintWriter;
+import java.nio.file.Files;
+
 /**
  * This class is thread safe.
  */
 public class Parser {
   private File file;
+  //I would remove the setter/getter for file and make it a parameter to the constructor.
+  //If a user needs to change the file, it should require a new parser.
   public synchronized void setFile(File f) {
     file = f;
   }
   public synchronized File getFile() {
     return file;
   }
+
   public String getContent() throws IOException {
-    FileInputStream i = new FileInputStream(file);
-    String output = "";
-    int data;
-    while ((data = i.read()) > 0) {
-      output += (char) data;
-    }
-    return output;
+    byte[] bytes = Files.readAllBytes(file.toPath());
+    return new String(bytes);
   }
+  //TODO: implement a FilteredInputStream that takes a lambda for which characters to skip
+  //this would allow alternate cases to be easily implemented and use that stream to read
+  //the character. Also would use a stringbuffer instead of string concat (more performant)
   public String getContentWithoutUnicode() throws IOException {
     FileInputStream i = new FileInputStream(file);
     String output = "";
@@ -34,9 +38,7 @@ public String getContentWithoutUnicode() throws IOException {
     return output;
   }
   public void saveContent(String content) throws IOException {
-    FileOutputStream o = new FileOutputStream(file);
-    for (int i = 0; i < content.length(); i += 1) {
-      o.write(content.charAt(i));
-    }
+      PrintWriter writer = new PrintWriter(file);
+      writer.print(content);
   }
 }