001 /* 002 * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more 003 * contributor license agreements. See the NOTICE file distributed with 004 * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership. 005 * The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache license, Version 2.0 006 * (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with 007 * the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at 008 * 009 * http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0 010 * 011 * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software 012 * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, 013 * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. 014 * See the license for the specific language governing permissions and 015 * limitations under the license. 016 */ 017 package org.apache.logging.log4j; 018 019 import java.io.Serializable; 020 021 /** 022 * Markers are objects that are used to add easily filterable information to log messages. 023 * 024 * Markers can be hierarchical - each Marker may have a parent. This allows for broad categories 025 * being subdivided into more specific categories. An example might be a Marker named "Error" with 026 * children named "SystemError" and "ApplicationError". 027 */ 028 public interface Marker extends Serializable { 029 030 /** 031 * Returns the name of this Marker. 032 * @return The name of the Marker. 033 */ 034 String getName(); 035 036 /** 037 * Returns the parent of this Marker. 038 * @return The parent Marker or null if this Marker has no parent. 039 */ 040 Marker getParent(); 041 042 /** 043 * Checks whether this Marker is an instance of the specified Marker. 044 * @param m The Marker to check. 045 * @return true of this Marker or one of its ancestors is the specified Marker, false otherwise. 046 */ 047 boolean isInstanceOf(Marker m); 048 049 /** 050 * Checks whether this Marker is an instance of the specified Marker. 051 * @param name The name of the Marker. 052 * @return true of this Marker or one of its ancestors matches the specified name, false otherwise. 053 */ 054 boolean isInstanceOf(String name); 055 }