/*
 * Copyright 2000 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.imageio.spi;

import javax.imageio.ImageTranscoder;

/**
 * The service provider interface (SPI) for <code>ImageTranscoder</code>s.
 * For more information on service provider classes, see the class comment
 * for the <code>IIORegistry</code> class.
 *
 * @see IIORegistry
 * @see javax.imageio.ImageTranscoder
 *
 */
public abstract class ImageTranscoderSpi extends IIOServiceProvider {

    /**
     * Constructs a blank <code>ImageTranscoderSpi</code>.  It is up
     * to the subclass to initialize instance variables and/or
     * override method implementations in order to provide working
     * versions of all methods.
     */
    protected ImageTranscoderSpi() {
    }

    /**
     * Constructs an <code>ImageTranscoderSpi</code> with a given set
     * of values.
     *
     * @param vendorName the vendor name.
     * @param version a version identifier.
     */
    public ImageTranscoderSpi(String vendorName,
                              String version) {
        super(vendorName, version);
    }

    /**
     * Returns the fully qualified class name of an
     * <code>ImageReaderSpi</code> class that generates
     * <code>IIOMetadata</code> objects that may be used as input to
     * this transcoder.
     *
     * @return a <code>String</code> containing the fully-qualified
     * class name of the <code>ImageReaderSpi</code> implementation class.
     *
     * @see ImageReaderSpi
     */
    public abstract String getReaderServiceProviderName();

    /**
     * Returns the fully qualified class name of an
     * <code>ImageWriterSpi</code> class that generates
     * <code>IIOMetadata</code> objects that may be used as input to
     * this transcoder.
     *
     * @return a <code>String</code> containing the fully-qualified
     * class name of the <code>ImageWriterSpi</code> implementation class.
     *
     * @see ImageWriterSpi
     */
    public abstract String getWriterServiceProviderName();

    /**
     * Returns an instance of the <code>ImageTranscoder</code>
     * implementation associated with this service provider.
     *
     * @return an <code>ImageTranscoder</code> instance.
     */
    public abstract ImageTranscoder createTranscoderInstance();
}