/*
 * Copyright (c) OSGi Alliance (2016). All Rights Reserved.
 *
 * Licensed 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.
 */
package org.apache.felix.serializer;

import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.OutputStream;
import java.nio.charset.Charset;

import org.osgi.annotation.versioning.ProviderType;
import org.osgi.util.converter.Converter;
import org.osgi.util.converter.Specifying;

/**
 * Interface to specify the target of the encoding operation.
 *
 * @author $Id$
 * @ThreadSafe
 */
@ProviderType
public interface Serializing extends Specifying<Serializing> {
	/**
	 * Use an output stream as the target of the encoding operation. UTF-8 will
	 * be used if applicable, the character set may not apply to binary
	 * encodings.
	 *
	 * @param out The output stream to use.
	 * @throws IOException If an I/O error occurred.
	 */
	void to(OutputStream out) throws IOException;

	/**
	 * Use an output stream as the target of the encoding operation.
	 *
	 * @param out The output stream to use.
	 * @param charset The character set to use, if applicable, the character set
	 *            may not apply to binary encodings.
	 * @throws IOException If an I/O error occurred.
	 */
	void to(OutputStream out, Charset charset) throws IOException;

	/**
	 * Encode the object and append the result to an appendable.
	 *
	 * @param out The appendable object to use.
	 * @return The appendable object provided in, which allows further appends
	 *         to it be done in a fluent programming style.
	 */
	Appendable to(Appendable out);

	/**
	 * Encode the object and return the result as a string.
	 *
	 * @return The encoded object.
	 */
	@Override
	String toString();

	/**
	 * Specify the converter to be used by the code, if an alternative, adapted,
	 * converter is to be used.
	 *
	 * @param converter The converter to use.
	 * @return This Serializing object to allow further invocations on it.
	 */
	Serializing convertWith(Converter converter);

    /**
     * Specify the writer to be used, if an alternative to the default internal
     * writer is required. A selection of Writers are available via the WriterFactory,
     * or a completely different Writer can be provided directly.
     * 
     * @param parser the writer to use.
     * @return This Serializing object to allow further invocations on it.
     */
    Serializing writeWith(Writer writer);
}