package org.apache.commons.digester3;

/*
 * 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.
 */

/**
 * <p>
 * Public interface defining a shorthand means of configuring a complete set of related <code>Rule</code> definitions,
 * possibly associated with a particular namespace URI, in one operation. To use an instance of a class that imlements
 * this interface:
 * </p>
 * <ul>
 * <li>Create a concrete implementation of this interface.</li>
 * <li>Optionally, you can configure a <code>RuleSet</code> to be relevant only for a particular namespace URI by
 * configuring the value to be returned by <code>getNamespaceURI()</code>.</li>
 * <li>As you are configuring your Digester instance, call <code>digester.addRuleSet()</code> and pass the RuleSet
 * instance.</li>
 * <li>Digester will call the <code>addRuleInstances()</code> method of your RuleSet to configure the
 * necessary rules.</li>
 * </ul>
 */
public interface RuleSet
{

    // ------------------------------------------------------------- Properties

    /**
     * Return the namespace URI that will be applied to all Rule instances created from this RuleSet.
     *
     * @return the namespace URI that will be applied to all Rule instances created from this RuleSet
     */
    String getNamespaceURI();

    // --------------------------------------------------------- Public Methods

    /**
     * Add the set of Rule instances defined in this RuleSet to the specified <code>Digester</code> instance,
     * associating them with our namespace URI (if any). This method should only be called by a Digester instance.
     * 
     * @param digester Digester instance to which the new Rule instances should be added.
     */
    void addRuleInstances( Digester digester );

}