Can anyone give me a basic script that takes a string and converts it into a characters using the nexttoken command to get the next char for searching purposes.

Try using a while loop and character array. Also look up StringTokenizer in the API: http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/api/

You should be able to work it out from there.

I used the buffered reader to get the line. Then a string tokenizer to get it into seperate words. I have no idea on getting the words broken into chars

Ok look up String in the API - there are two methods which you can use in there.

and heres a tutorial on conversion:
http://mindprod.com/jgloss/conversion.html

Hope that helps

Alright I got it into an array... Now I can't get through the array. I'm using a for loop to search character by character. At the end of the first character array i get an exception error and cant get past that part. Any other ideas for a way to get through the character array.

Thats the best way to get through an array - is the exception error a arrayoutofbounds one? Check your i<whatever bit in the forloop - it may trying to check out more spaces in the array than there actually are.