1 /*
2 * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
3 * contributor license agreements. See the NOTICE file distributed with
4 * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
5 * The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
6 * (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
7 * the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at
8 *
9 * http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
10 *
11 * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
12 * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
13 * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
14 * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
15 * limitations under the License.
16 */
17 package org.apache.commons.collections;
18
19 /**
20 * Defines a functor interface implemented by classes that create objects.
21 * <p>
22 * A <code>Factory</code> creates an object without using an input parameter.
23 * If an input parameter is required, then {@link Transformer} is more appropriate.
24 * <p>
25 * Standard implementations of common factories are provided by
26 * {@link FactoryUtils}. These include factories that return a constant,
27 * a copy of a prototype or a new instance.
28 *
29 * @param <T> the type that the factory creates
30 *
31 * @since 2.1
32 * @version $Id: Factory.java 1361710 2012-07-15 15:00:21Z tn $
33 */
34 public interface Factory<T> {
35
36 /**
37 * Create a new object.
38 *
39 * @return a new object
40 * @throws FunctorException (runtime) if the factory cannot create an object
41 */
42 public T create();
43
44 }