    001    /*
    002     * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
    003     * contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file distributed with
    004     * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
    005     * The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
    006     * (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
    007     * the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
    008     *
    009     *      http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
    010     *
    011     * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
    012     * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
    013     * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
    014     * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
    015     * limitations under the License.
    016     */
    017
    018
    019    package org.apache.commons.beanutils;
    020
    021
    022
    023
    024
    025    /**
    026     * <p>A <strong>DynaClass</strong> is a simulation of the functionality of
    027     * <code>java.lang.Class</code> for classes implementing the
    028     * <code>DynaBean</code> interface.  DynaBean instances that share the same
    029     * DynaClass all have the same set of available properties, along with any
    030     * associated data types, read-only states, and write-only states.</p>
    031     *
    032     * @author Craig McClanahan
    033     * @author Michael Smith
    034     * @author Paulo Gaspar
    035     * @version $Revision: 555824 $ $Date: 2007-07-13 01:27:15 +0100 (Fri, 13 Jul 2007) $
    036     */
    037
    038    public interface DynaClass {
    039
    040
    041        /**
    042         * Return the name of this DynaClass (analogous to the
    043         * <code>getName()</code> method of <code>java.lang.Class</code), which
    044         * allows the same <code>DynaClass</code> implementation class to support
    045         * different dynamic classes, with different sets of properties.
    046         *
    047         * @return the name of the DynaClass
    048         */
    049        public String getName();
    050
    051
    052        /**
    053         * Return a property descriptor for the specified property, if it exists;
    054         * otherwise, return <code>null</code>.
    055         *
    056         * @param name Name of the dynamic property for which a descriptor
    057         *  is requested
    058         * @return The descriptor for the specified property
    059         *
    060         * @exception IllegalArgumentException if no property name is specified
    061         */
    062        public DynaProperty getDynaProperty(String name);
    063
    064
    065        /**
    066         * <p>Return an array of <code>ProperyDescriptors</code> for the properties
    067         * currently defined in this DynaClass.  If no properties are defined, a
    068         * zero-length array will be returned.</p>
    069         *
    070         * <p><strong>FIXME</strong> - Should we really be implementing
    071         * <code>getBeanInfo()</code> instead, which returns property descriptors
    072         * and a bunch of other stuff?</p>
    073         *
    074         * @return the set of properties for this DynaClass
    075         */
    076        public DynaProperty[] getDynaProperties();
    077
    078
    079        /**
    080         * Instantiate and return a new DynaBean instance, associated
    081         * with this DynaClass.
    082         *
    083         * @return A new <code>DynaBean</code> instance
    084         *
    085         * @exception IllegalAccessException if the Class or the appropriate
    086         *  constructor is not accessible
    087         * @exception InstantiationException if this Class represents an abstract
    088         *  class, an array class, a primitive type, or void; or if instantiation
    089         *  fails for some other reason
    090         */
    091        public DynaBean newInstance()
    092                throws IllegalAccessException, InstantiationException;
    093
    094
    095    }