/*
* 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.geode.internal.lang;
/**
* The Orderable interface defines a contract for classes whose Objects can be sorted, or ordered
* according to the order property of a Comparable type.
* <p/>
*
* @see java.lang.Comparable
* @since GemFire 6.8
*/
public interface Orderable<T extends Comparable<T>> {
/**
* Returns the value of the order property used in ordering instances of this implementing Object
* relative to other type compatible Object instances. The order property value can also be used
* in sorting operations, or in maintaining Orderable objects in ordered data structures like
* arrays or Lists, or even for defining a precedence not directly related order.
* <p/>
*
* @return a value that is Comparable to other value of the same type and defines the relative
* order of this Object instance to it's peers.
*/
public T getOrder();
}