/*
 * JBoss, Home of Professional Open Source.
 * See the COPYRIGHT.txt file distributed with this work for information
 * regarding copyright ownership.  Some portions may be licensed
 * to Red Hat, Inc. under one or more contributor license agreements.
 * 
 * This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
 * modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public
 * License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either
 * version 2.1 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
 * 
 * This library is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 * but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
 * MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU
 * Lesser General Public License for more details.
 * 
 * You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public
 * License along with this library; if not, write to the Free Software
 * Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA
 * 02110-1301 USA.
 */

package org.teiid.core.designer.id;



/**
 * @since 8.0
 */
public interface ObjectID extends Comparable {

    char DELIMITER = ':';

    /**
     * Compares this object to another. If the specified object is not an instance of
     * the ObjectID class, then this method throws a
     * ClassCastException (as instances are comparable only to instances of the same
     * class).
     * Note:  this method <i>is</i> consistent with <code>equals()</code>, meaning
     * that <code>(compare(x, y)==0) == (x.equals(y))</code>.
     * <p>
     * @param obj the object that this instance is to be compared to; may not be null.
     * @return a negative integer, zero, or a positive integer as this object
     *      is less than, equal to, or greater than the specified object, respectively.
     * @throws ClassCastException if the specified object's type prevents it
     *      from being compared to this instance.
     */
    @Override
	int compareTo(Object obj);
    /**
     * Returns a string representing the current state of the object.
     * @return the string representation of this instance.
     */
    @Override
	String toString();
    /**
     * Returns a string representing the current state of the object.
     * @param delim the delimiter that should be used
     * @return the string representation of this instance.
     */
    String toString( char delim );
    /**
     * Return the name of the protocol that this factory uses.
     * @return the protocol name
     */
    String getProtocol();
}