1 /* 2 * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more 3 * contributor license agreements. See the NOTICE file distributed with 4 * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership. 5 * The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache license, Version 2.0 6 * (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with 7 * the License. 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 package org.apache.logging.log4j; 18 19 import java.io.Serializable; 20 21 /** 22 * Markers are objects that are used to add easily filterable information to log messages. 23 * 24 * Markers can be hierarchical - each Marker may have a parent. This allows for broad categories 25 * being subdivided into more specific categories. An example might be a Marker named "Error" with 26 * children named "SystemError" and "ApplicationError". 27 */ 28 public interface Marker extends Serializable { 29 30 /** 31 * Returns the name of this Marker. 32 * @return The name of the Marker. 33 */ 34 String getName(); 35 36 /** 37 * Returns the parent of this Marker. 38 * @return The parent Marker or null if this Marker has no parent. 39 */ 40 Marker getParent(); 41 42 /** 43 * Checks whether this Marker is an instance of the specified Marker. 44 * @param m The Marker to check. 45 * @return true of this Marker or one of its ancestors is the specified Marker, false otherwise. 46 */ 47 boolean isInstanceOf(Marker m); 48 49 /** 50 * Checks whether this Marker is an instance of the specified Marker. 51 * @param name The name of the Marker. 52 * @return true of this Marker or one of its ancestors matches the specified name, false otherwise. 53 */ 54 boolean isInstanceOf(String name); 55 }