/*

 * Copyright 2000-2005 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 javax.xml.transform;

import java.util.Properties;

/**

 * An object that implements this interface is the runtime representation of processed

 * transformation instructions.

 *

 * <p>Templates must be threadsafe for a given instance

 * over multiple threads running concurrently, and may

 * be used multiple times in a given session.</p>

 */

public interface Templates {

    /**

     * Create a new transformation context for this Templates object.

     *

     * @return A valid non-null instance of a Transformer.

     *

     * @throws TransformerConfigurationException if a Transformer can not be created.

     */

    Transformer newTransformer() throws TransformerConfigurationException;

    /**

     * Get the properties corresponding to the effective xsl:output element.

     * The object returned will

     * be a clone of the internal values. Accordingly, it can be mutated

     * without mutating the Templates object, and then handed in to

     * {@link javax.xml.transform.Transformer#setOutputProperties}.

     *

     * <p>The properties returned should contain properties set by the stylesheet,

     * and these properties are "defaulted" by default properties specified by

     * <a href="http://www.w3.org/TR/xslt#output">section 16 of the

     * XSL Transformations (XSLT) W3C Recommendation</a>.  The properties that

     * were specifically set by the stylesheet should be in the base

     * Properties list, while the XSLT default properties that were not

     * specifically set should be in the "default" Properties list.  Thus,

     * getOutputProperties().getProperty(String key) will obtain any

     * property in that was set by the stylesheet, <em>or</em> the default

     * properties, while

     * getOutputProperties().get(String key) will only retrieve properties

     * that were explicitly set in the stylesheet.</p>

     *

     * <p>For XSLT,

     * <a href="http://www.w3.org/TR/xslt#attribute-value-templates">Attribute

     * Value Templates</a> attribute values will

     * be returned unexpanded (since there is no context at this point).  The

     * namespace prefixes inside Attribute Value Templates will be unexpanded,

     * so that they remain valid XPath values.</p>

     *

     * @return A Properties object, never null.

     */

    Properties getOutputProperties();

}