/*
 *  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 java.lang.reflect;

import java.lang.annotation.Annotation;

/**
 * <p>
 * An interface implemented an annotated element to enable reflective access to
 * annotation information.
 * </p>
 *
 * @since 1.5
 */
public interface AnnotatedElement
{

	/**
	 * <p>
	 * Gets the {@link Annotation} for this element for the annotation type
	 * passed, if it exists.
	 * </p>
	 *
	 * @param annotationType The Class instance of the annotation to search for.
	 * @return The {@link Annotation} for this element or <code>null</code>.
	 * @throws NullPointerException if <code>annotationType</code> is
	 *         <code>null</code>.
	 */
	<T extends Annotation> T getAnnotation(Class<T> annotationType);

	/**
	 * <p>
	 * Gets all {@link Annotation}s for this element.
	 * </p>
	 *
	 * @return An array of {@link Annotation}s, which may be empty, but never
	 *         <code>null</code>.
	 */
	Annotation[] getAnnotations();

	/**
	 * <p>
	 * Gets all {@link Annotation}s that are explicitly declared by this
	 * element (not inherited).
	 * </p>
	 *
	 * @return An array of {@link Annotation}s, which may be empty, but never
	 *         <code>null</code>.
	 */
	Annotation[] getDeclaredAnnotations();

	/**
	 * <p>
	 * Determines if this element has an annotation for the annotation type
	 * passed.
	 * </p>
	 *
	 * @param annotationType The class instance of the annotation to search for.
	 * @return <code>true</code> if the annotation exists, otherwise
	 *         <code>false</code>.
	 * @throws NullPointerException if <code>annotationType</code> is
	 *         <code>null</code>.
	 */
	boolean isAnnotationPresent(Class<? extends Annotation> annotationType);
}