fr.gael.drb
Interface DrbAttribute

All Superinterfaces:

DrbItem

All Known Implementing Classes:

DrbAbstractAttribute, DrbDefaultAttribute

public interface DrbAttribute
extends DrbItem

Generic attribute interface. The attributes are information related to a specific node (i.e. the owner). Any attribute has a name and corresponding value. This last value can be set from the owner node or hinerited from a default value. This ambiguity is important to consider while using attribute values. For instance the attribute "length"of a specific node, may be equal to 123 from a default value (i.e. defined by the implementation of the node) or because it was effectively embedded in the supported data source (e.g. the XML document). The name of the attribute is unique in the set of attributes of the same node. No specific contrainst is imposed for the order of attributes.

Field Summary

Fields inherited from interface fr.gael.drb.DrbItem

ATTRIBUTE_ITEM, NODE_ITEM, UNDEFINED_ITEM, VALUE_ITEM

Method Summary

String	getName() Name of the attribute.
String	getNamespaceURI() Get namespace URI.
DrbNode	getOwner() The node the owning the current attribute.
Value	getValue() The value of the attribute.
int	getValueType() The value type of the attribute.
boolean	isSpecified() The attribute was explicitly given a value.

Methods inherited from interface fr.gael.drb.DrbItem

getItemType, rename, setNamespaceURI, setValue

Method Detail

getName

String getName()

Name of the attribute. Returns the name of the attribute. This name does not contain any prefix, path nor any other location or identification part. This name clearly identfies the attibute in the set of attribute of the same node. This name is unique is this set. The attribute name is never an empty string and always exists.

Specified by:

getName in interface DrbItem

Returns:

The name of the attribute.

getOwner

DrbNode getOwner()

The node the owning the current attribute. Returns a reference to the node to which belongs this attribute. Because the attribute may have just been created it may have no owner. This operation is similar to a getParent().

Returns:

The owner of the attribute.

getValueType

int getValueType()

The value type of the attribute. All node have a value according to the fr.gael.drb.value package. This operation returns the type identifier of the content of the current attribute. The value of the attribute depends on the implementation as well as on the attribute itself. This operation never returns a fr.gael.drb.value.Value.NULL_ID identifier.

Returns:

The type of the attribute.

getNamespaceURI

String getNamespaceURI()

Get namespace URI. The namespace URI of this attribute, or null if it is unspecified. This is not a computed value that is the result of a namespace lookup based on an examination of the namespace declarations in scope. It is merely the namespace URI given at creation time. The Namespaces on an attribute does not inherit its namespace from the element it is attached to. If an attribute is not explicitly given a namespace, it simply has no namespace

Specified by:

getNamespaceURI in interface DrbItem

Returns:

The namspace URI or null if unspecified.

getValue

Value getValue()

The value of the attribute. The value is expressed accoring to one of the types supported by the fr.gael.drb.value package. Generally these types correspond to primitive types (e.g. integer, floatting points, etc.) or very low level types (e.g. string, date, etc.). On the contrary to DOM implementation all the types are allowed even the arrays, date etc. Only the Value.NULL_ID type is forbidden.

Specified by:

getValue in interface DrbItem

Returns:

The value of the attribute.

isSpecified

boolean isSpecified()

The attribute was explicitly given a value. This operation returns true if the attribute was explicitly given an value in the data source handled by the current implementation (e.g. a node of an XML document). Otherwise the value is inherited from a default value.

Returns:

false is a defaulted value or true otherwise.