/*
* $Id: TilesContainer.java 1044659 2010-12-11 14:16:04Z apetrelli $
*
* 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. The ASF licenses this file
* to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
* "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
* with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at
*
* http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
*
* Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
* software distributed under the License is distributed on an
* "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
* KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the
* specific language governing permissions and limitations
* under the License.
*/
package org.apache.tiles;
import java.io.
IOException;
import org.apache.tiles.request.
ApplicationContext;
import org.apache.tiles.request.
Request;
/**
* An encapsulation of the tiles framework. This interface is
* used to expose tiles features to frameworks which leverage
* it as a plugin. It can alternately be used by web applications
* which would like a programmatic interface.
*
* @since 2.0
* @version $Rev: 1044659 $ $Date: 2010-12-12 01:16:04 +1100 (Sun, 12 Dec 2010) $
*/
public interface
TilesContainer {
/**
* Retrieve the containers context.
*
* @return current application context
*/
ApplicationContext getApplicationContext();
/**
* Retrive the attribute context of the current request.
* @param request The request.
* @return map of the attributes in the current attribute context.
*/
AttributeContext getAttributeContext(
Request request);
/**
* Starts a new context, where attribute values are stored independently
* from others.<br>
* When the use of the contexts is finished, call
* {@link TilesContainer#endContext(Request)}
* @param request The request.
*
* @return The newly created context.
*/
AttributeContext startContext(
Request request);
/**
* Ends a context, where attribute values are stored independently
* from others.<br>
* It must be called after a
* {@link TilesContainer#startContext(Request)} call.
* @param request The request.
*/
void
endContext(
Request request);
/**
* Renders the current context, as it is.
* @param request The request.
*
* @since 2.1.0
*/
void
renderContext(
Request request);
/**
* Executes a preparer.
*
* @param preparer The name of the preparer to execute.
* @param request The request.
*/
void
prepare(
String preparer,
Request request);
/**
* Render the given tiles request.
*
* @param definition the current definition.
* @param request The request.
*/
void
render(
String definition,
Request request);
/**
* Renders the specified definition.
* @param definition The definition to render.
* @param request The request context.
*/
void
render(
Definition definition,
Request request);
/**
* Render the given Attribute.
*
* @param attribute The attribute to render.
* @param request The request.
* @throws IOException If something goes wrong during writing to the output.
* @since 2.1.2
*/
void
render(
Attribute attribute,
Request request)
throws
IOException;
/**
* Evaluates the given attribute.
*
* @param attribute The attribute to evaluate.
* @param request The request.
* @return The evaluated object.
* @since 2.1.0
*/
Object evaluate(
Attribute attribute,
Request request);
/**
* Returns a definition specifying its name.
*
* @param definitionName The name of the definition to find.
* @param request The request context.
* @return The definition, if found.
*/
Definition getDefinition(
String definitionName,
Request request);
/**
* Determine whether or not the definition exists.
*
* @param definition the name of the definition.
* @param request The request.
* @return true if the definition is found.
*/
boolean
isValidDefinition(
String definition,
Request request);
}