001/* $Id: AnnotationRuleProvider.java 992060 2010-09-02 19:09:47Z simonetripodi $
002 *
003 * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
004 * contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file distributed with
005 * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
006 * The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
007 * (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
008 * the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
009 *
010 *      http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
011 *
012 * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
013 * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
014 * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
015 * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
016 * limitations under the License.
017 */
018package org.apache.commons.digester.annotations;
019
020import java.lang.annotation.Annotation;
021import java.lang.reflect.AnnotatedElement;
022
023import org.apache.commons.digester.Rule;
024
025/**
026 * An object capable of providing instances of {@link Rule}.
027 *
028 * @since 2.1
029 */
030public interface AnnotationRuleProvider<A extends Annotation, E extends AnnotatedElement, R extends Rule> {
031
032    /**
033     * Initializes the provider.
034     *
035     * @param annotation the annotation instance.
036     * @param element the annotated element reference.
037     */
038    void init(A annotation, E element);
039
040    /**
041     * Provides an instance of {@link Rule}.
042     *
043     * Must never return null.
044     *
045     * @return an instance of {@link Rule}.
046     */
047    R get();
048
049}