nsIXULTemplateQueryProcessor.idl

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 * The Original Code is mozilla.org code.
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 * The Initial Developer of the Original Code is Neil Deakin.
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 * Contributor(s):
 *  Laurent Jouanneau <laurent.jouanneau@disruptive-innovations.com>
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#include "domstubs.idl"
#include "nsISupports.idl"

interface nsIAtom;
interface nsIArray;
interface nsISimpleEnumerator;
interface nsIXULTemplateResult;
interface nsIXULTemplateRuleFilter;
interface nsIXULTemplateBuilder;

/**
 * A query processor takes a template query and generates results for it given
 * a datasource and a reference point. There is a one-to-one relationship
 * between a template builder and a query processor. The template builder
 * creates the query processor, and there is no other means to retrieve it.
 *
 * A template query is the contents inside a <query> element within the
 * template. The actual syntax is opaque to the template builder and defined
 * by a query processor. The query is expected to consist of either text or
 * DOM nodes that, when executed by a call to the generateResults method, will
 * allow the generation of a list of results.
 *
 * The template builder will supply two variables, the reference variable and
 * the member variable to further indicate what part of the datasource is to
 * be examined in addition to the query itself. The reference is always
 * a placeholder for the starting point and the member is always a placeholder
 * for the end points (the results).
 *
 * The reference point is important when generating output recursively, as
 * the query will be the same for each iteration, however, the reference point
 * will differ.
 *
 * For instance, when examining an XML source, an XML query processor might
 * begin at the node referred by the reference variable and end at a list of
 * that node's children.
 *
 * Some queries may not need the reference variable if the syntax or the form
 * of the data implies the value. For instance, a datasource that holds a
 * table that can only produce one set of results.
 *
 * The reference variable may be specified in a template by setting the
 * "container" attribute on the <template> element to the variable to use. The
 * member variable may be specified in a similar way using the "member"
 * attribute, or it may be specified in the first <action> body in the
 * template as the value of a uri attribute on an element. A breadth-first
 * search of the first action is performed to find this element.
 *
 * If unspecified, the default value of the reference variable is ?uri.
 *
 * For example, a query might have the following syntax:
 *
 * (?id, ?name, ?url) from Bookmarks where parentfolder = ?start
 *
 * This query might generate a result for each bookmark within a given folder.
 * The variable ?start would be the reference variable, while the variable ?id
 * would be the member variable, since it is the unique value that identifies
 * a result. Each result will have the four variables referred to defined for
 * it and the values may be retrieved using the result's getBindingFor and
 * getBindingObjectFor methods.
 *
 * The template builder must call initializeForBuilding before the other
 * methods, except for translateRef. The builder will then call compileQuery
 * for each query in the template to compile the queries. When results need
 * to be generated, the builder will call generateResults. The
 * initializeForBuilding, compileQuery and addBinding methods may not be
 * called after generateResults has been called until the builder indicates
 * that the generated output is being removed by calling the done method.
 *
 * Currently, the datasource supplied to the methods will always be an
 * nsIRDFDataSource or a DOM node, and will always be the same one in between
 * calls to initializeForBuilding and done.
 */
[scriptable, uuid(C257573F-444F-468A-BA27-DE979DC55FE4)]
interface nsIXULTemplateQueryProcessor : nsISupports
{
  /**
   * Retrieve the datasource to use for the query processor. The list of
   * datasources in a template is specified using the datasources attribute as
   * a space separated list of URIs. This list is processed by the builder and
   * supplied to the query processor in the aDataSources array as a list of
   * nsIURI objects or nsIDOMNode objects. This method may return an object
   * corresponding to these URIs and the builder will supply this object to
   * other query processor methods. For example, for an XML source, the
   * datasource might be an nsIDOMNode.
   *
   * All of these URIs are checked by the builder so it is safe to use them,
   * however note that a URI that redirects may still needs to be checked to
   * ensure that the document containing aRootNode may access it. This is the
   * responsibility of the query processor if it needs to load the content of
   * the URI.
   *
   * If the query processor needs to load the datasource asynchronously, it
   * may set the aShouldDelayBuilding returned parameter to true to delay
   * building the template content, and call the builder's Rebuild method when
   * the data is available.
   *
   * @param aDataSources  the list of nsIURI objects and/or nsIDOMNode objects
   * @param aRootNode     the root node the builder is attached to
   * @param aIsTrusted    true if the template is in a trusted document
   * @param aBuilder      the template builder
   * @param aShouldDelayBuilding [out] whether the builder should wait to
   *                                   build the content or not
   * @returns a datasource object
   */
  nsISupports getDatasource(in nsIArray aDataSources,
                            in nsIDOMNode aRootNode,
                            in boolean aIsTrusted,
                            in nsIXULTemplateBuilder aBuilder,
                            out boolean aShouldDelayBuilding);

  /**
   * Initialize for query generation. This will be called before the rules are
   * processed and whenever the template is rebuilt. This method must be
   * called once before any of the other query processor methods except for
   * translateRef.
   *
   * @param aDatasource datasource for the data
   * @param aBuilder the template builder
   * @param aRootNode the root node the builder is attached to
   *
   * @throws NS_ERROR_INVALID_ARG if the datasource is not supported or
   *         NS_ERROR_UNEXPECTED if generateResults has already been called.
   */
  void initializeForBuilding(in nsISupports aDatasource,
                             in nsIXULTemplateBuilder aBuilder,
                             in nsIDOMNode aRootNode);

  /**
   * Called when the template builder is being destroyed so that the query
   * processor can clean up any state. The query processor should remove as
   * much state as possible, such as results or references to the builder.
   * This method will also be called when the template is going to be rebuilt.
   */
  void done();

  /**
   * Compile a query from a node. The result of this function will later be
   * passed to generateResults for result generation. If null is returned,
   * the query will be ignored.
   *
   * The template builder will call this method once for each query within
   * the template, before any results can be generated using generateResults,
   * but after initializeForBuilding has been called. This method should not
   * be called again for the same query unless the template is rebuilt.
   *
   * The reference variable may be used by the query processor as a
   * placeholder for the reference point, or starting point in the query.
   *
   * The member variable is determined from the member attribute on the
   * template, or from the uri in the first action's rule if that attribute is
   * not present. A rule processor may use the member variable as a hint to
   * indicate what variable is expected to contain the results.
   *
   * @param aBuilder the template builder
   * @param aQuery <query> node to compile
   * @param aRefVariable the reference variable
   * @param aMemberVariable the member variable
   *
   * @returns a compiled query object
   */
  nsISupports compileQuery(in nsIXULTemplateBuilder aBuilder,
                           in nsIDOMNode aQuery,
                           in nsIAtom aRefVariable,
                           in nsIAtom aMemberVariable);

  /**
   * Generate the results of a query and return them in an enumerator. The
   * enumerator must contain nsIXULTemplateResult objects. If there are no
   * results, an empty enumerator must be returned.
   *
   * The datasource will be the same as the one passed to the earlier
   * initializeForBuilding method. The context reference (aRef) is a reference
   * point used when calculating results.
   *
   * The value of aQuery must be the result of a previous call to compileQuery
   * from this query processor. This method may be called multiple times,
   * typically with different values for aRef.
   *
   * @param aDatasource datasource for the data
   * @param aRef context reference value used as a starting point
   * @param aQuery the compiled query returned from query compilation
   *
   * @returns an enumerator of nsIXULTemplateResult objects as the results
   *
   * @throws NS_ERROR_INVALID_ARG if aQuery is invalid
   */
  nsISimpleEnumerator generateResults(in nsISupports aDatasource,
                                      in nsIXULTemplateResult aRef,
                                      in nsISupports aQuery);

  /**
   * Add a variable binding for a particular rule. A binding allows an
   * additional variable to be set for a result, outside of those defined
   * within the query. These bindings are always optional, in that they will
   * never affect the results generated.
   *
   * This function will never be called after generateResults. Any bindings
   * that were added should be applied to each result when the result's
   * ruleMatched method is called, since the bindings are different for each
   * rule.
   *
   * The reference aRef may be used to determine the reference when
   * calculating the value for the binding, for example when a value should
   * depend on the value of another variable.
   *
   * The syntax of the expression aExpr is defined by the query processor. If
   * the syntax is invalid, the binding should be ignored. Only fatal errors
   * should be thrown, or NS_ERROR_UNEXPECTED if generateResults has already
   * been called.
   *
   * As an example, if the reference aRef is the variable '?count' which
   * holds the value 5, and the expression aExpr is the string '+2', the value
   * of the variable aVar would be 7, assuming the query processor considers
   * the syntax '+2' to mean add two to the reference.
   *
   * @param aRuleNode rule to add the binding to
   * @param aVar variable that will be bound
   * @param aRef variable that holds reference value
   * @param aExpr expression used to compute the value to assign
   */
  void addBinding(in nsIDOMNode aRuleNode,
                  in nsIAtom aVar,
                  in nsIAtom aRef,
                  in AString aExpr);

  /**
   * Translate a ref attribute string into a result. This is used as the
   * reference point by the template builder when generating the first level
   * of content. For recursive generation, the result from the parent
   * generation phase will be used directly as the reference so a translation
   * is not needed. This allows all levels to be generated using objects that
   * all implement the nsIXULTemplateResult interface.
   *
   * This method may be called before initializeForBuilding, so the
   * implementation may use the supplied datasource if it is needed to
   * translate the reference.
   *
   * @param aDatasource datasource for the data
   * @param aRefString the ref attribute string
   *
   * @return the translated ref
   */
  nsIXULTemplateResult translateRef(in nsISupports aDatasource,
                                    in AString aRefString);

  /**
   * Compare two results to determine their order, used when sorting results.
   * This method should return -1 when the left result is less than the right,
   * 0 if both are equivalent, and 1 if the left is greater than the right.
   * The comparison should only consider the values for the specified
   * variable.
   *
   * If the comparison variable is null, the results may be
   * sorted in a natural order, for instance, based on the order the data in
   * stored in the datasource.
   *
   * The sort hints are the flags in nsIXULSortService.
   *
   * This method must only be called with results that were created by this
   * query processor.
   *
   * @param aLeft the left result to compare
   * @param aRight the right result to compare
   * @param aVar variable to compare
   *
   * @param returns -1 if less, 0 if equal, or 1 if greater
   */
   PRInt32 compareResults(in nsIXULTemplateResult aLeft,
                          in nsIXULTemplateResult aRight,
                          in nsIAtom aVar,
                          in unsigned long aSortHints);
};