fulmine.model.field
Interface IField

All Superinterfaces:

Cloneable, IAddressable, IComponent, IDescriptor, IDestroyable, IEvent, IEventSource, ILifeCycle, IWireState

All Known Subinterfaces:

IContainerDefinitionField

All Known Implementing Classes:

AbstractField, BooleanField, ContainerDefinitionField, DescriptorField, DoubleField, FloatField, IntegerField, LongField, StringField

public interface IField
extends IComponent, Cloneable

A field represents a property of an entity. The entity is represented by an IContainer. A field can be naturally added to a container and becomes part of the container's state.

A field is wire-state aware; it knows its data type and also includes the logic to read and write its identity and data into byte[] form. The reading and writing is an asymmetrical operation; a field can write its identity and data to a byte[] but can only read the data from the byte[], it cannot read its identity from a byte[], that is the responsibility of the parent container. This is because a container receives the wire frame and needs to locate each field expressed in the wire frame and pass the byte[] to the field.

A field can have a non-unique wire identity so long as no other field in the container shares the same wire identity. As an example, a field with a wire value 'XYZ' can identify a 'foo' field in record type A and a 'bar' field in record type B. These records are separate objects that will be sent as separate wire messages and so can share the same field wire value.

Note fields are equal by their type and encapsulated property value. Equality does not take into account the record of the field. Thus if 2 fields both called 'foo', belonging to different records, have the same type and value, they are equal.

Fields are given a permission by the creating application code. This permission governs whether receiving contexts can view the field's value.

Author:

Ramon Servadei

See Also:

IWireState, IWireIdentity, IPermissionProfile

Method Summary

void	addedToContainer(IContainer container) Signals the field that it has been added to a container.
Object	clone() Clone this.
byte	getApplication() Get the application code for the field.
IContainer	getContainer() Get the container this field has been added to
short	getPermission() Get the permission code for the field.
Object	getValue() Get the field value
String	getValueAsString() Get the value of this field as a string.
void	removedFromContainer(IContainer container) Signals the field that it has been removed from a container.
boolean	setValueFromString(String value) Set the field value from the string.

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.protocol.wire.IWireState

readState, writeState

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.event.IEventSource

addEvent, addListener, getEventSourceGroupId, getListeners, removeListener, removeListeners

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.IDescriptor

toDetailedString, toIdentityString

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.ILifeCycle

isActive, start

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.IDestroyable

destroy

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.IAddressable

getAddress, getDomain, getIdentity, getType

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.event.IEvent

getDrivingFrame, getFrame, getSource, getTriggerEvent, setTriggerEvent

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.IDescriptor

toDetailedString, toIdentityString

Methods inherited from interface fulmine.IAddressable

getAddress, getDomain, getIdentity, getType

Method Detail

addedToContainer

void addedToContainer(IContainer container)

Signals the field that it has been added to a container.

Parameters:

container - the container that now has a reference to this

getContainer

IContainer getContainer()

Get the container this field has been added to

Returns:

the IContainer this belongs to

removedFromContainer

void removedFromContainer(IContainer container)

Signals the field that it has been removed from a container.

Parameters:

container - the container that removed a reference to this

clone

Object clone()
             throws CloneNotSupportedException

Clone this.

Specified by:

clone in interface IEvent

Returns:

a clone of this

Throws:

CloneNotSupportedException

See Also:

Object.clone()

getValueAsString

String getValueAsString()

Get the value of this field as a string.

Returns:

a string representing the value of this field.

getValue

Object getValue()

Get the field value

Returns:

the field type

getPermission

short getPermission()

Get the permission code for the field.

Returns:

the permission code for the field

See Also:

IPermissionProfile

getApplication

byte getApplication()

Get the application code for the field.

Returns:

the application code for the field

See Also:

IPermissionProfile

setValueFromString

boolean setValueFromString(String value)

Set the field value from the string. The field converts the string into the field's data format. If there is an error performing this, the operation simply returns false or throws a RuntimeException.

Parameters:

value - the value to set

Returns:

true if the value changed, false if it did not or there was a problem converting the string to the field's data format