001    /*******************************************************************************
002     * Portions created by Sebastian Thomschke are copyright (c) 2005-2011 Sebastian
003     * Thomschke.
004     * 
005     * All Rights Reserved. This program and the accompanying materials
006     * are made available under the terms of the Eclipse Public License v1.0
007     * which accompanies this distribution, and is available at
008     * http://www.eclipse.org/legal/epl-v10.html
009     * 
010     * Contributors:
011     *     Sebastian Thomschke - initial implementation.
012     *******************************************************************************/
013    package net.sf.oval.expression;
014    
015    import java.util.Map;
016    
017    import net.sf.oval.exception.ExpressionEvaluationException;
018    
019    /**
020     * @author Sebastian Thomschke
021     *
022     */
023    public interface ExpressionLanguage
024    {
025            /**
026             * Evaluates the given expression.
027             * @param expression the expression to evaluate
028             * @param values context values passed to the interpreter
029             * @return the result of the expression evaluation
030             * @throws ExpressionEvaluationException in case of an invalid expression
031             */
032            Object evaluate(String expression, Map<String, ? > values) throws ExpressionEvaluationException;
033    
034            /**
035             * Evaluates the given expression and expects it to return a boolean.
036             * @param expression the expression to evaluate
037             * @param values context values passed to the interpreter
038             * @return the result of the expression evaluation 
039             * @throws ExpressionEvaluationException If an error during evaluation occurs or if the return value is not a boolean value.
040             */
041            boolean evaluateAsBoolean(String expression, Map<String, ? > values) throws ExpressionEvaluationException;
042    }