| gvSIG desktop 1

/* gvSIG. Geographic Information System of the Valencian Government

 *

 * Copyright (C) 2007-2008 Infrastructures and Transports Department

 * of the Valencian Government (CIT)

 *

 * This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or

 * modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License

 * as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2

 * 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 General Public License for more details.

 *

 * You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License

 * along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software

 * Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston,

 * MA  02110-1301, USA.

 *

 */

/*

* AUTHORS (In addition to CIT):

* 2008 IVER T.I. S.A.   {{Task}}

*/

package org.gvsig.fmap.dal;

import org.gvsig.tools.persistence.Persistent;

/**

 * This interface is a generic persistent parameter container. It is used in a variety 

 * of contexts in which a set of arbitrary parameters is needed.

 */

public interface DataParameters extends Persistent {

        /**

         * Returns the value of an attribute given its name.

         * 

         * @param name 

         *                         of the attribute

         * @return value of the attribute

         */

        public Object getAttribute(String name);

        /**

         * Sets the value of an attribute

         * 

         * @param name of the attribute, if it exists it is overwritten, if it does not exist it 

         *                         is added to the container.

         * @param value attribute's value

         * @return this

         */

        public DataParameters setAttribute(String name, Object value);

        /**

         * clears the parameter container.

         */

        public void clear();

        /**

         * Creates and returns a new copy of this DataParameters.

         * 

         * @return a new copy of this

         */

        public DataParameters getCopy();

}