001package org.apache.maven.settings.building;
002
003/*
004 * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one
005 * or more contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file
006 * distributed with this work for additional information
007 * regarding copyright ownership.  The ASF licenses this file
008 * to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
009 * "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
010 * with the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
011 *
012 *   http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
013 *
014 * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
015 * software distributed under the License is distributed on an
016 * "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
017 * KIND, either express or implied.  See the License for the
018 * specific language governing permissions and limitations
019 * under the License.
020 */
021
022import java.io.IOException;
023import java.io.InputStream;
024
025/**
026 * Provides access to the contents of settings independently of the backing store (e.g. file system, database, memory).
027 * 
028 * @author Benjamin Bentmann
029 */
030public interface SettingsSource
031{
032
033    /**
034     * Gets a byte stream to the settings contents. Closing the returned stream is the responsibility of the caller.
035     * Note that each invocation of this method returns a new/fresh stream which represents the entire contents.
036     * 
037     * @return A byte stream to the settings contents, never {@code null}.
038     */
039    InputStream getInputStream()
040        throws IOException;
041
042    /**
043     * Provides a user-friendly hint about the location of the settings. This could be a local file path, a URI or just
044     * an empty string. The intention is to assist users during error reporting.
045     * 
046     * @return A user-friendly hint about the location of the settings, never {@code null}.
047     */
048    String getLocation();
049
050}