001    /*
002     *  Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one
003     *  or more contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file
004     *  distributed with this work for additional information
005     *  regarding copyright ownership.  The ASF licenses this file
006     *  to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
007     *  "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
008     *  with the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
009     *  
010     *    http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
011     *  
012     *  Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
013     *  software distributed under the License is distributed on an
014     *  "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
015     *  KIND, either express or implied.  See the License for the
016     *  specific language governing permissions and limitations
017     *  under the License. 
018     *  
019     */
020    package org.apache.directory.shared.ldap.schema;
021    
022    
023    import java.io.Serializable;
024    
025    import javax.naming.NamingException;
026    
027    import org.apache.directory.shared.ldap.entry.Value;
028    
029    
030    /**
031     * Converts attribute values to a canonical form.
032     * 
033     * @author <a href="mailto:dev@directory.apache.org">Apache Directory Project</a>
034     * @version $Rev: 798550 $
035     */
036    public interface Normalizer extends Serializable
037    {
038        /**
039         * Gets the normalized value.
040         * 
041         * @param value the value to normalize. It must *not* be null !
042         * @return the normalized form for a value
043         * @throws NamingException if an error results during normalization
044         */
045        Value<?> normalize( Value<?> value ) throws NamingException;
046    
047        /**
048         * Gets the normalized value.
049         * 
050         * @param value the value to normalize. It must *not* be null !
051         * @return the normalized form for a value
052         * @throws NamingException if an error results during normalization
053         */
054        String normalize( String value ) throws NamingException;
055    }