/*

 * Copyright 2007-2009 Sun Microsystems, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.

 * DO NOT ALTER OR REMOVE COPYRIGHT NOTICES OR THIS FILE HEADER.

 *

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

 * under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 2 only, as

 * published by the Free Software Foundation.  Sun designates this

 * particular file as subject to the "Classpath" exception as provided

 * by Sun in the LICENSE file that accompanied this code.

 *

 * This code 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

 * version 2 for more details (a copy is included in the LICENSE file that

 * accompanied this code).

 *

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

 * 2 along with this work; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation,

 * Inc., 51 Franklin St, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA.

 *

 * Please contact Sun Microsystems, Inc., 4150 Network Circle, Santa Clara,

 * CA 95054 USA or visit www.sun.com if you need additional information or

 * have any questions.

 */

package java.nio.file.attribute;

import java.security.Principal;

/**

 * A {@code Principal} representing an identity used to determine access rights

 * to objects in a file system.

 *

 * <p> On many platforms and file systems an entity requires appropriate access

 * rights or permissions in order to access objects in a file system. The

 * access rights are generally performed by checking the identity of the entity.

 * For example, on implementations that use Access Control Lists (ACLs) to

 * enforce privilege separation then a file in the file system may have an

 * associated ACL that determines the access rights of identities specified in

 * the ACL.

 *

 * <p> A {@code UserPrincipal} object is an abstract representation of an

 * identity. It has a {@link #getName() name} that is typically the username or

 * account name that it represents. User principal objects may be obtained using

 * a {@link UserPrincipalLookupService}, or returned by {@link

 * FileAttributeView} implementations that provide access to identity related

 * attributes. For example, the {@link AclFileAttributeView} and {@link

 * PosixFileAttributeView} provide access to a file's {@link

 * PosixFileAttributes#owner owner}.

 *

 * @since 1.7

 */

public interface UserPrincipal extends Principal { }