001    /*
002     * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
003     * contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file distributed with
004     * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
005     * The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
006     * (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
007     * the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
008     * 
009     *      http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
010     * 
011     * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
012     * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
013     * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
014     * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
015     * limitations under the License.
016     */ 
017    package org.apache.commons.betwixt.io.read;
018    
019    /**  
020      * A Chain of bean creators.
021      *
022      * @author Robert Burrell Donkin
023      * @since 0.5
024      */
025    public abstract class BeanCreationChain {
026    
027        
028    //-------------------------------------------------------- Class Methods
029    
030        /** 
031         * Creates the default <code>BeanCreationChain</code> used when reading beans.
032         * @return a <code>BeanCreationList</code> with the default creators loader in order, not null
033         */
034        public static final BeanCreationChain createDefaultChain() {
035            // this delegates to the list but this is the canonical version
036            // the implementation may change later
037            return BeanCreationList.createStandardChain();
038        }
039        
040    //-------------------------------------------------------- Instance Methods
041    
042        /** 
043          * Create a bean for the given mapping in the given context.
044          *
045          * @param elementMapping specifies the mapping between the type and element.
046          * <strong>Note</strong> it is recommended that classes do not store a permenant
047          * reference to this object since these objects may later be reused.
048          * Not null
049          * @param context the context in which this creation happens, not null
050          * @return the bean, possibly null
051          */
052        public abstract Object create(ElementMapping elementMapping, ReadContext context);
053        
054    }