1 /***
2 *
3 * Copyright 2004 Hiram Chirino
4 *
5 * Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
6 * you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
7 * 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
18 package org.activeio;
19
20 import java.io.IOException;
21
22
23 /***
24 * RequestChannel are used to model the request/reponse exchange that is used
25 * by higher level protcols such as HTTP and RMI.
26 *
27 * @version $Revision$
28 */
29 public interface RequestChannel extends Channel {
30
31 /***
32 * Used to send a packet of information going 'down' the channel and wait for
33 * it's reponse 'up' packet.
34 *
35 * This method blocks until the response packet is received or the operation
36 * experiences a timeout.
37 *
38 * @param request
39 * @param timeout
40 * @return the respnse packet or null if the timeout occured.
41 * @throws IOException
42 */
43 Packet request(Packet request, long timeout) throws IOException;
44
45 /***
46 * Registers the {@see RequestListener} that the protcol will use to deliver request packets
47 * comming 'up' the channel.
48 *
49 * @param packetListener
50 * @throws IOException
51 */
52 void setRequestListener(RequestListener requestListener) throws IOException;
53
54 /***
55 * @return the registered RequestListener
56 */
57 RequestListener getRequestListener();
58
59 }