/*
 *  RapidMiner
 *
 *  Copyright (C) 2001-2011 by Rapid-I and the contributors
 *
 *  Complete list of developers available at our web site:
 *
 *       http://rapid-i.com
 *
 *  This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
 *  it under the terms of the GNU Affero General Public License as published by
 *  the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
 *  (at your option) any later version.
 *
 *  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 Affero General Public License for more details.
 *
 *  You should have received a copy of the GNU Affero General Public License
 *  along with this program.  If not, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.
 */
package com.rapidminer;

import java.io.IOException;

import com.rapidminer.tools.ProgressListener;
import com.rapidminer.tools.XMLException;

/** A place where a process can be saved. Basically, this is either a file
 *  or a location in a repository. 
 * 
 * @author Simon Fischer
 * */
public interface ProcessLocation {
	
	/** Reads the process and returns it. */
	public Process load(ProgressListener listener) throws IOException, XMLException;
	
	/** Stores the process at the referenced location. */
	public void store(Process process, ProgressListener listener) throws IOException;

	/** The toString representation is used, e.g. in the welcome screen dialog, */
	public String toString();
	
	/** Reads the contents of the referenced resource and returns the XML without parsing it. 
	 *  Used if process file is broken. */
	public String getRawXML() throws IOException;
	
	/** Returns a string saved to the history file. */
	public String toHistoryFileString();

	/** Returns a string as it is displayed in the recent files menu. */
	public String toMenuString();

	/** Returns a short name, e.g. the last component of the path. */
	public String getShortName();
}