/*
 * Hibernate, Relational Persistence for Idiomatic Java
 *
 * Copyright (c) 2011, Red Hat Inc. or third-party contributors as
 * indicated by the @author tags or express copyright attribution
 * statements applied by the authors.  All third-party contributions are
 * distributed under license by Red Hat Inc.
 *
 * This copyrighted material is made available to anyone wishing to use, modify,
 * copy, or redistribute it subject to the terms and conditions of the GNU
 * Lesser General Public License, as published by the Free Software Foundation.
 *
 * This program 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 distribution; if not, write to:
 * Free Software Foundation, Inc.
 * 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor
 * Boston, MA  02110-1301  USA
 */
package org.hibernate.metamodel.source.binder;

/**
 * Contract for sources of persistent attribute descriptions.
 *
 * @author Steve Ebersole
 */
public interface AttributeSource {
	/**
	 * Obtain the attribute name.
	 *
	 * @return The attribute name. {@code null} ais NOT allowed!
	 */
	public String getName();

	/**
	 * Is this a singular attribute?  Specifically, can it be cast to {@link SingularAttributeSource}?
	 *
	 * @return {@code true} indicates this is castable to {@link SingularAttributeSource}; {@code false} otherwise.
	 */
	public boolean isSingular();

	/**
	 * Obtain information about the Hibernate type ({@link org.hibernate.type.Type}) for this attribute.
	 *
	 * @return The Hibernate type information
	 */
	public ExplicitHibernateTypeSource getTypeInformation();

	/**
	 * Obtain the name of the property accessor style used to access this attribute.
	 *
	 * @return The property accessor style for this attribute.
	 *
	 * @see org.hibernate.property.PropertyAccessor
	 */
	public String getPropertyAccessorName();

	/**
	 * If the containing entity is using {@link org.hibernate.engine.OptimisticLockStyle#ALL} or
	 * {@link org.hibernate.engine.OptimisticLockStyle#DIRTY} style optimistic locking, should this attribute
	 * be used?
	 *
	 * @return {@code true} indicates it should be included; {@code false}, it should not.
	 */
	public boolean isIncludedInOptimisticLocking();

	/**
	 * Obtain the meta-attribute sources associated with this attribute.
	 *
	 * @return The meta-attribute sources.
	 */
	public Iterable<MetaAttributeSource> metaAttributes();
}