Index: solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestMultiWordSynonyms.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestMultiWordSynonyms.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestMultiWordSynonyms.java	(working copy)
@@ -62,24 +62,4 @@
     // This fails because ["e","e"] is the value of the token stream
     assertTokenStreamContents(ts, new String[] { "a", "e" });
   }
-  
-  private class StringMockSolrResourceLoader implements ResourceLoader {
-    String text;
-
-    StringMockSolrResourceLoader(String text) {
-      this.text = text;
-    }
-
-    public List<String> getLines(String resource) throws IOException {
-      return null;
-    }
-
-    public <T> T newInstance(String cname, Class<T> expectedType, String... subpackages) {
-      return null;
-    }
-
-    public InputStream openResource(String resource) throws IOException {
-      return new ByteArrayInputStream(text.getBytes("UTF-8"));
-    }
-  }
 }
Index: solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestSynonymMap.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestSynonymMap.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestSynonymMap.java	(working copy)
@@ -19,6 +19,7 @@
 
 import java.io.IOException;
 import java.io.InputStream;
+import java.nio.charset.Charset;
 import java.util.ArrayList;
 import java.util.HashMap;
 import java.util.List;
@@ -272,27 +273,7 @@
     args.put( "synonyms", "something.txt" );
     SlowSynonymFilterFactory ff = new SlowSynonymFilterFactory();
     ff.init(args);
-    ff.inform( new ResourceLoader() {
-      @Override
-      public List<String> getLines(String resource) throws IOException {
-        if( !"something.txt".equals(resource) ) {
-          throw new RuntimeException( "should not get a differnt resource" );
-        }
-        List<String> rules = new ArrayList<String>();
-        rules.add( "a,b" );
-        return rules;
-      }
-
-      @Override
-      public <T> T newInstance(String cname, Class<T> expectedType, String... subpackages) {
-        throw new RuntimeException("stub");
-      }
-
-      @Override
-      public InputStream openResource(String resource) throws IOException {
-        throw new RuntimeException("stub");
-      }
-    });
+    ff.inform(new StringMockSolrResourceLoader("a,b"));
     
     SlowSynonymMap synMap = ff.getSynonymMap();
     assertEquals( 2, synMap.submap.size() );
Index: solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/SnowballPorterFilterFactoryTest.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/SnowballPorterFilterFactoryTest.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/SnowballPorterFilterFactoryTest.java	(working copy)
@@ -53,32 +53,12 @@
 
     factory.setLuceneMatchVersion(TEST_VERSION_CURRENT);
     factory.init(args);
-    factory.inform(new LinesMockSolrResourceLoader(new ArrayList<String>()));
+    factory.inform(new StringMockSolrResourceLoader(""));
     Tokenizer tokenizer = new MockTokenizer(
         new StringReader(StrUtils.join(Arrays.asList(test), ' ')), MockTokenizer.WHITESPACE, false);
     TokenStream stream = factory.create(tokenizer);
     assertTokenStreamContents(stream, gold);
   }
-
-  class LinesMockSolrResourceLoader implements ResourceLoader {
-    List<String> lines;
-
-    LinesMockSolrResourceLoader(List<String> lines) {
-      this.lines = lines;
-    }
-
-    public List<String> getLines(String resource) throws IOException {
-      return lines;
-    }
-
-    public <T> T newInstance(String cname, Class<T> expectedType, String... subpackages) {
-      return null;
-    }
-
-    public InputStream openResource(String resource) throws IOException {
-      return null;
-    }
-  }
   
   /**
    * Test the protected words mechanism of SnowballPorterFilterFactory
Index: solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestCollationKeyFilterFactory.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestCollationKeyFilterFactory.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestCollationKeyFilterFactory.java	(working copy)
@@ -156,26 +156,6 @@
     assertCollatesToSame(tsUmlaut, tsOE);
   }
   
-  private class StringMockSolrResourceLoader implements ResourceLoader {
-    String text;
-
-    StringMockSolrResourceLoader(String text) {
-      this.text = text;
-    }
-
-    public List<String> getLines(String resource) throws IOException {
-      return null;
-    }
-
-    public <T> T newInstance(String cname, Class<T> expectedType, String... subpackages) {
-      return null;
-    }
-
-    public InputStream openResource(String resource) throws IOException {
-      return new ByteArrayInputStream(text.getBytes("UTF-8"));
-    }
-  }
-  
   private void assertCollatesToSame(TokenStream stream1, TokenStream stream2)
       throws IOException {
     stream1.reset();
Index: solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestSynonymFilterFactory.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestSynonymFilterFactory.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/analysis/TestSynonymFilterFactory.java	(working copy)
@@ -97,24 +97,4 @@
     TokenStream ts = factory.create(new MockTokenizer(new StringReader("GB"), MockTokenizer.WHITESPACE, false));
     assertTokenStreamContents(ts, new String[] { "GB" });
   }
-  
-  private class StringMockSolrResourceLoader implements ResourceLoader {
-    String text;
-
-    StringMockSolrResourceLoader(String text) {
-      this.text = text;
-    }
-
-    public List<String> getLines(String resource) throws IOException {
-      return Arrays.asList(text.split("\n"));
-    }
-
-    public <T> T newInstance(String cname, Class<T> expectedType, String... subpackages) {
-      return null;
-    }
-
-    public InputStream openResource(String resource) throws IOException {
-      return new ByteArrayInputStream(text.getBytes("UTF-8"));
-    }
-  }
 }
Index: solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/core/ResourceLoaderTest.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/core/ResourceLoaderTest.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/core/ResourceLoaderTest.java	(working copy)
@@ -19,6 +19,7 @@
 
 import junit.framework.Assert;
 
+import org.apache.lucene.util.IOUtils;
 import org.apache.lucene.util.LuceneTestCase;
 import org.apache.solr.analysis.KeywordTokenizerFactory;
 import org.apache.solr.analysis.NGramFilterFactory;
@@ -30,6 +31,7 @@
 import org.apache.solr.util.plugin.SolrCoreAware;
 
 import java.io.File;
+import java.io.IOException;
 import java.io.InputStream;
 import java.nio.charset.CharacterCodingException;
 import java.util.Arrays;
@@ -114,7 +116,7 @@
     }
 
     // now make sure getLines skips the BOM...
-    List<String> lines = loader.getLines(fileWithBom);
+    List<String> lines = loader.getLines(fileWithBom, IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
     assertEquals(1, lines.size());
     assertEquals("BOMsAreEvil", lines.get(0));
   }
@@ -124,10 +126,10 @@
     SolrResourceLoader loader = new SolrResourceLoader(null);
     // ensure we get our exception
     try {
-      List<String> lines = loader.getLines(wrongEncoding);
+      loader.getLines(wrongEncoding, IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
       fail();
-    } catch (SolrException expected) {
-      assertTrue(expected.getCause() instanceof CharacterCodingException);
+    } catch (IOException expected) {
+      assertTrue(CharacterCodingException.class.isInstance(expected));
     }
   }
 }
Index: solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/TypeTokenFilterFactory.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/TypeTokenFilterFactory.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/TypeTokenFilterFactory.java	(working copy)
@@ -21,6 +21,7 @@
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.core.TypeTokenFilter;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.InitializationException;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.ResourceLoader;
+import org.apache.lucene.util.IOUtils;
 import org.apache.solr.common.util.StrUtils;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.ResourceLoaderAware;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.TokenFilterFactory;
@@ -54,7 +55,7 @@
         if (files.size() > 0) {
           stopTypes = new HashSet<String>();
           for (String file : files) {
-            List<String> typesLines = loader.getLines(file.trim());
+            List<String> typesLines = loader.getLines(file.trim(), IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
             stopTypes.addAll(typesLines);
           }
         }
Index: solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/MappingCharFilterFactory.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/MappingCharFilterFactory.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/MappingCharFilterFactory.java	(working copy)
@@ -1,4 +1,6 @@
-/**
+package org.apache.solr.analysis;
+
+/*
  * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
  * contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file distributed with
  * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
@@ -15,8 +17,6 @@
  * limitations under the License.
  */
 
-package org.apache.solr.analysis;
-
 import java.io.File;
 import java.io.IOException;
 import java.util.ArrayList;
@@ -28,6 +28,7 @@
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.charfilter.MappingCharFilter;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.charfilter.NormalizeCharMap;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.*;
+import org.apache.lucene.util.IOUtils;
 import org.apache.solr.common.util.StrUtils;
 
 /**
@@ -58,13 +59,13 @@
       try{
         File mappingFile = new File( mapping );
         if( mappingFile.exists() ){
-          wlist = loader.getLines( mapping );
+          wlist = loader.getLines(mapping, IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
         }
         else{
           List<String> files = StrUtils.splitFileNames( mapping );
           wlist = new ArrayList<String>();
           for( String file : files ){
-            List<String> lines = loader.getLines( file.trim() );
+            List<String> lines = loader.getLines(file.trim(), IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
             wlist.addAll( lines );
           }
         }
Index: solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/WordDelimiterFilterFactory.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/WordDelimiterFilterFactory.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/WordDelimiterFilterFactory.java	(working copy)
@@ -1,4 +1,6 @@
-/**
+package org.apache.solr.analysis;
+
+/*
  * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
  * contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file distributed with
  * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
@@ -15,13 +17,12 @@
  * limitations under the License.
  */
 
-package org.apache.solr.analysis;
-
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.TokenStream;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.miscellaneous.WordDelimiterFilter;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.miscellaneous.WordDelimiterIterator;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.*;
 
+import org.apache.lucene.util.IOUtils;
 import org.apache.solr.common.util.StrUtils;
 
 import java.util.ArrayList;
@@ -70,7 +71,7 @@
         List<String> files = StrUtils.splitFileNames( types );
         List<String> wlist = new ArrayList<String>();
         for( String file : files ){
-          List<String> lines = loader.getLines( file.trim() );
+          List<String> lines = loader.getLines(file.trim(), IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
           wlist.addAll( lines );
         }
       typeTable = parseTypes(wlist);
Index: solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/StemmerOverrideFilterFactory.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/StemmerOverrideFilterFactory.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/StemmerOverrideFilterFactory.java	(working copy)
@@ -23,6 +23,7 @@
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.TokenStream;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.miscellaneous.StemmerOverrideFilter;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.*;
+import org.apache.lucene.util.IOUtils;
 import org.apache.solr.common.util.StrUtils;
 
 /**
@@ -51,7 +52,7 @@
           dictionary = new CharArrayMap<String>(luceneMatchVersion, 
               files.size() * 10, ignoreCase);
           for (String file : files) {
-            List<String> list = loader.getLines(file.trim());
+            List<String> list = loader.getLines(file.trim(), IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
             for (String line : list) {
               String[] mapping = line.split("\t", 2);
               dictionary.put(mapping[0], mapping[1]);
Index: solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/SlowSynonymFilterFactory.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/SlowSynonymFilterFactory.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/SlowSynonymFilterFactory.java	(working copy)
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.TokenStream;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.tokenattributes.CharTermAttribute;
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.*;
+import org.apache.lucene.util.IOUtils;
 import org.apache.solr.common.util.StrUtils;
 
 import java.io.File;
@@ -71,12 +72,12 @@
     try {
       File synonymFile = new File(synonyms);
       if (synonymFile.exists()) {
-        wlist = loader.getLines(synonyms);
+        wlist = loader.getLines(synonyms, IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
       } else  {
         List<String> files = StrUtils.splitFileNames(synonyms);
         wlist = new ArrayList<String>();
         for (String file : files) {
-          List<String> lines = loader.getLines(file.trim());
+          List<String> lines = loader.getLines(file.trim(), IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
           wlist.addAll(lines);
         }
       }
Index: solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/core/SolrResourceLoader.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/core/SolrResourceLoader.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/core/SolrResourceLoader.java	(working copy)
@@ -63,7 +63,7 @@
 /**
  * @since solr 1.3
  */ 
-public class SolrResourceLoader implements ResourceLoader
+public class SolrResourceLoader extends ResourceLoader
 {
   public static final Logger log = LoggerFactory.getLogger(SolrResourceLoader.class);
 
@@ -296,73 +296,6 @@
     return is;
   }
 
-  /**
-   * Accesses a resource by name and returns the (non comment) lines
-   * containing data.
-   *
-   * <p>
-   * A comment line is any line that starts with the character "#"
-   * </p>
-   *
-   * @param resource
-   * @return a list of non-blank non-comment lines with whitespace trimmed
-   * from front and back.
-   * @throws IOException
-   */
-  public List<String> getLines(String resource) throws IOException {
-    return getLines(resource, UTF_8);
-  }
-
-  /**
-   * Accesses a resource by name and returns the (non comment) lines containing
-   * data using the given character encoding.
-   *
-   * <p>
-   * A comment line is any line that starts with the character "#"
-   * </p>
-   *
-   * @param resource the file to be read
-   * @param encoding
-   * @return a list of non-blank non-comment lines with whitespace trimmed
-   * @throws IOException
-   */
-  public List<String> getLines(String resource,
-      String encoding) throws IOException {
-    return getLines(resource, Charset.forName(encoding));
-  }
-
-
-  public List<String> getLines(String resource, Charset charset) throws IOException{
-    BufferedReader input = null;
-    ArrayList<String> lines;
-    try {
-      input = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(openResource(resource),
-          charset.newDecoder()
-          .onMalformedInput(CodingErrorAction.REPORT)
-          .onUnmappableCharacter(CodingErrorAction.REPORT)));
-
-      lines = new ArrayList<String>();
-      for (String word=null; (word=input.readLine())!=null;) {
-        // skip initial bom marker
-        if (lines.isEmpty() && word.length() > 0 && word.charAt(0) == '\uFEFF')
-          word = word.substring(1);
-        // skip comments
-        if (word.startsWith("#")) continue;
-        word=word.trim();
-        // skip blank lines
-        if (word.length()==0) continue;
-        lines.add(word);
-      }
-    } catch (CharacterCodingException ex) {
-      throw new SolrException(SolrException.ErrorCode.SERVER_ERROR, 
-          "Error loading resource (wrong encoding?): " + resource, ex);
-    } finally {
-      if (input != null)
-        input.close();
-    }
-    return lines;
-  }
-
   /*
    * A static map of short class name to fully qualified class name 
    */
Index: solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/common/ResourceLoader.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/common/ResourceLoader.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/common/ResourceLoader.java	(working copy)
@@ -22,5 +22,5 @@
  * be removed in (5.0). Use {@link org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.ResourceLoader}
  */
 @Deprecated
-public interface ResourceLoader extends org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.ResourceLoader {
+public abstract class ResourceLoader extends org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.ResourceLoader {
 }
Index: solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/spelling/FileBasedSpellChecker.java
===================================================================
--- solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/spelling/FileBasedSpellChecker.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/spelling/FileBasedSpellChecker.java	(working copy)
@@ -18,6 +18,7 @@
 
 import java.io.IOException;
 import java.io.InputStreamReader;
+import java.nio.charset.Charset;
 import java.util.List;
 
 import org.apache.lucene.index.*;
@@ -101,7 +102,7 @@
                 // .setCodec(core.getCodec())
         );
 
-        List<String> lines = core.getResourceLoader().getLines(sourceLocation, characterEncoding);
+        List<String> lines = core.getResourceLoader().getLines(sourceLocation, Charset.forName(characterEncoding));
 
         for (String s : lines) {
           Document d = new Document();
Index: solr/test-framework/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/StringMockSolrResourceLoader.java
===================================================================
--- solr/test-framework/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/StringMockSolrResourceLoader.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ solr/test-framework/src/java/org/apache/solr/analysis/StringMockSolrResourceLoader.java	(working copy)
@@ -20,26 +20,24 @@
 import java.io.ByteArrayInputStream;
 import java.io.IOException;
 import java.io.InputStream;
+import java.nio.charset.Charset;
 import java.util.Arrays;
 import java.util.List;
 
 import org.apache.lucene.analysis.util.ResourceLoader;
 
-class StringMockSolrResourceLoader implements ResourceLoader {
+class StringMockSolrResourceLoader extends ResourceLoader {
   String text;
 
   StringMockSolrResourceLoader(String text) {
     this.text = text;
   }
 
-  public List<String> getLines(String resource) throws IOException {
+  @Override
+  public List<String> getLines(String resource, Charset charset) throws IOException {
     return Arrays.asList(text.split("\n"));
   }
 
-  public <T> T newInstance(String cname, Class<T> expectedType, String... subpackages) {
-    return null;
-  }
-
   public InputStream openResource(String resource) throws IOException {
     return new ByteArrayInputStream(text.getBytes("UTF-8"));
   }
Index: lucene/analysis/common/src/java/org/apache/lucene/analysis/util/AbstractAnalysisFactory.java
===================================================================
--- lucene/analysis/common/src/java/org/apache/lucene/analysis/util/AbstractAnalysisFactory.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ lucene/analysis/common/src/java/org/apache/lucene/analysis/util/AbstractAnalysisFactory.java	(working copy)
@@ -17,16 +17,10 @@
  * limitations under the License.
  */
 
-import org.apache.lucene.analysis.core.StopFilter;
 import org.apache.lucene.util.IOUtils;
 import org.apache.lucene.util.Version;
 
-import java.io.IOException;
-import java.io.InputStream;
-import java.io.InputStreamReader;
-import java.io.Reader;
-import java.nio.charset.CharsetDecoder;
-import java.nio.charset.CodingErrorAction;
+import java.io.*;
 import java.util.ArrayList;
 import java.util.Collections;
 import java.util.List;
@@ -107,17 +101,16 @@
     assureMatchVersion();
     List<String> files = splitFileNames(wordFiles);
     CharArraySet words = null;
-    if (files.size() > 0) {
-      // default stopwords list has 35 or so words, but maybe don't make it that
-      // big to start
-      words = new CharArraySet(luceneMatchVersion,
-          files.size() * 10, ignoreCase);
-      for (String file : files) {
-        List<String> wlist = loader.getLines(file.trim());
-        words.addAll(StopFilter.makeStopSet(luceneMatchVersion, wlist,
-            ignoreCase));
-      }
+
+    if (files.isEmpty()) {
+      return words;
     }
+
+    // default stopwords list has 35 or so words, but maybe don't make it that big to start
+    words = new CharArraySet(luceneMatchVersion, files.size() * 10, ignoreCase);
+    for (String file : files) {
+      words.addAll(loader.getLines(file.trim(), IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8));
+    }
     return words;
   }
 
@@ -128,24 +121,22 @@
     assureMatchVersion();
     List<String> files = splitFileNames(wordFiles);
     CharArraySet words = null;
-    if (files.size() > 0) {
-      // default stopwords list has 35 or so words, but maybe don't make it that
-      // big to start
-      words = new CharArraySet(luceneMatchVersion,
-          files.size() * 10, ignoreCase);
-      for (String file : files) {
-        InputStream stream = null;
-        Reader reader = null;
-        try {
-          stream = loader.openResource(file.trim());
-          CharsetDecoder decoder = IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8.newDecoder()
-              .onMalformedInput(CodingErrorAction.REPORT)
-              .onUnmappableCharacter(CodingErrorAction.REPORT);
-          reader = new InputStreamReader(stream, decoder);
-          WordlistLoader.getSnowballWordSet(reader, words);
-        } finally {
-          IOUtils.closeWhileHandlingException(reader, stream);
-        }
+
+    if (files.isEmpty()) {
+      return words;
+    }
+
+    // default stopwords list has 35 or so words, but maybe don't make it that big to start
+    words = new CharArraySet(luceneMatchVersion, files.size() * 10, ignoreCase);
+    for (String file : files) {
+      InputStream stream = null;
+      Reader reader = null;
+      try {
+        stream = loader.openResource(file.trim());
+        reader = IOUtils.getDecodingReader(stream, IOUtils.CHARSET_UTF_8);
+        WordlistLoader.getSnowballWordSet(reader, words);
+      } finally {
+        IOUtils.closeWhileHandlingException(reader, stream);
       }
     }
     return words;
@@ -159,8 +150,9 @@
    * @return a list of file names with the escaping backslashed removed
    */
   protected List<String> splitFileNames(String fileNames) {
-    if (fileNames == null)
+    if (fileNames == null) {
       return Collections.<String>emptyList();
+    }
 
     List<String> result = new ArrayList<String>();
     for (String file : fileNames.split("(?<!\\\\),")) {
Index: lucene/analysis/common/src/java/org/apache/lucene/analysis/util/ResourceLoader.java
===================================================================
--- lucene/analysis/common/src/java/org/apache/lucene/analysis/util/ResourceLoader.java	(revision 1338520)
+++ lucene/analysis/common/src/java/org/apache/lucene/analysis/util/ResourceLoader.java	(working copy)
@@ -17,18 +17,37 @@
  * limitations under the License.
  */
 
+import org.apache.lucene.util.IOUtils;
+
+import java.io.BufferedReader;
 import java.io.IOException;
 import java.io.InputStream;
+import java.nio.charset.Charset;
+import java.util.ArrayList;
 import java.util.List;
 
 /**
  * Abstraction for loading resources (streams, files, and classes).
  */
-public interface ResourceLoader {
+public class ResourceLoader {
 
-  public InputStream openResource(String resource) throws IOException;
-  
   /**
+   * Opens an InputStream for consuming the resource with the given name.
+   *
+   * @param resource Name of the resource to open an InputStream to
+   * @return InputStream for consuming the resource
+   * @throws IOException Thrown if the resource cannot be found and / or
+   *         the InputStream cannot be oepened
+   */
+  public InputStream openResource(String resource) throws IOException {
+    InputStream inputStream = getClass().getResourceAsStream(resource);
+    if (inputStream == null) {
+      throw new IOException("Resource [" + resource + "] not found");
+    }
+    return inputStream;
+  }
+
+  /**
    * Accesses a resource by name and returns the (non comment) lines
    * containing data.
    *
@@ -36,12 +55,44 @@
    * A comment line is any line that starts with the character "#"
    * </p>
    *
-   * @param resource
+   * @param resource Name of the source whose lines should be retreived
+   * @param charset Charset for decoding the contents of the resource
    * @return a list of non-blank non-comment lines with whitespace trimmed
    * from front and back.
-   * @throws IOException
+   * @throws IOException Can be thrown while opening, reading or closing the resource
    */
-  public List<String> getLines(String resource) throws IOException;
+  public List<String> getLines(String resource, Charset charset) throws IOException {
+    List<String> contents = new ArrayList<String>();
+
+    InputStream inputStream = null;
+    BufferedReader reader = null;
+    try {
+      inputStream = openResource(resource);
+      reader = (BufferedReader) IOUtils.getDecodingReader(inputStream, charset);
+      String line;
+      while ((line = reader.readLine()) != null) {
+        if (contents.isEmpty() && line.length() > 0 && line.charAt(0) == '\uFEFF') {
+          line = line.substring(1);
+        }
+
+        line = line.trim();
+
+        if (!line.startsWith("#") && !line.isEmpty()) {
+          contents.add(line);
+        }
+      }
+    } finally {
+      IOUtils.close(reader, inputStream);
+    }
+
+    return contents;
+  }
   
-  public <T> T newInstance(String cname, Class<T> expectedType, String ... subpackages);
+  public <T> T newInstance(String cname, Class<T> expectedType, String ... subpackages) {
+    try {
+      return Class.forName(cname).asSubclass(expectedType).newInstance();
+    } catch (Exception e) {
+      throw new RuntimeException("Exception thrown while creating instance of [" + cname + "]", e);
+    }
+  }
 }
\ No newline at end of file