atg.nucleus

Class BeanConfigurator

java.lang.Object

atg.nucleus.BeanConfigurator

public class BeanConfigurator
extends java.lang.Object

A BeanConfigurator configures a bean from a Properties list of name/value String pairs. Configuration includes setting property values, and hooking up event listeners.

The BeanConfigurator begins by obtaining the BeanInfo for the bean. The BeanInfo will list all of the bean's settable properties, and all of the bean's event sets.

The BeanConfigurator then enumerates through the bean's settable properties. For each property, the configurator looks in the Properties list for a property with the same name. Properties that take arrays as values are treated the same way. For example, two methods "setPrice(float)" and "setPrices(float[])" would define two properties: "price" and "prices". One property expects a "float" as a value, the other expects an array of floats as a value.

The BeanConfigurator then looks at the String value of the property and attempts to convert that value to the type expected for the property. The configurator knows how to perform conversions for the following types: boolean, byte, char, short, int, long, float, double, String, plus some others listed below. If the property value is actually an array of these types, then the values are expected to be separated by commas. As explained below, the BeanConfigurator can be extended to recognize other types of property values.

For example, using the above "price" and "prices" properties, the following lines in the Properties file would set the property values correctly:

   price=12.5
   prices=14.6,8.0,12.9
 

If the type of the property is not recognized by the configurator, then the configurator will assume that the property value names another service in the Nucleus. The name is resolved using a NameResolver. For example, if a property has the signature "setMimeTyper(MimeTyper)", then the configurator will expect a property with the name "mimeTyper", and the value of that property should name another bean in the nucleus of type "MimeTyper". For example:

   mimeTyper=../converters/MimeTyper
 

The same applies to array values. For example, if a property has the signature "setMimeTypers(MimeTyper[])", that property could be set with the line:

   mimeTypersList=../converters/MimeTyper,backups/MimeTyper
 

Both names will be resolved to beans in the nucleus and assigned to a two-element array which will in turn be assigned to the property.

Event sets are handled in a similar manner. If a bean has an event set called "notify", then the configurator will expect a property name "notifyListeners". The value of that property is treated as a comma-separated list of bean names that are resolved individually and added as listeners. For example:

   notifyListeners=../logs/NotifyLog,../scheduler/Schedules
 

As mentioned above, the BeanConfigurator can be extended to recognize new property types. One does this by registering implementations of java.beans.PropertyEditor, or by providing a named PropertyEditor class. These implementations must support the setAsText() and getAsText() methods. By default, the BeanConfigurator recognizes the following objects for which PropertyEditors are statically registered:

The primitives: boolean, byte, char, short, int, long, float, double. These are parsed into their primitive values. Char is parsed by taking the first character of the value. java.lang.String: the property value becomes the String java.io.File: a File object is created around the value. Any trailing "/" characters are removed, and the "/" character is converted to the OS-specific separator character. This allows the same File specification Strings to be used on all OS's. java.util.Date: the Date is parsed in a flexible format that contains both date and time. If either date or time is not specified, the current date or time is used instead. Some example valid dates you can use for nucleus date properties are:

    1/23/89
    1/23/89 4:45:21
    1/23/89 4:45
    1/23/1989 4:45
    4:45:21
    4:45pm
    April 23 89
    April 23 89 4pm
    23 April 89 4:45
  

java.net.InetAddress: the property value is a hostname, and is converted to and IP address. The hostname may be a machine name such as "www.atg.com", or it may be an IP addres such as "205.181.94.1". java.util.Properties: the properties are parsed in the form "prop1=val1,prop2=val2,prop3=val3...", where both the property names and values are converted to Strings. Property names and values cannot contain the characters "=" or ",". atg.service.scheduler.Schedule: this is used to define a Schedule for a job that will be passed to the Scheduler. See the documentation for SchedulePropertyEditor to see the format for specifying the schedule.

See Also:

ScheduleEditor