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/*******************************************************************************
 *  Copyright (C) 2007, 2015:
 *  
 *    - Ferdinando Villa 
 *    - integratedmodelling.org
 *    - any other authors listed in @author annotations
 *
 *    All rights reserved. This file is part of the k.LAB software suite,
 *    meant to enable modular, collaborative, integrated 
 *    development of interoperable data and model components. For
 *    details, see http://integratedmodelling.org.
 *    
 *    This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
 *    modify it under the terms of the Affero General Public License 
 *    Version 3 or any later version.
 *
 *    This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 *    but without any warranty; without even the implied warranty of
 *    merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.  See the
 *    Affero General Public License for more details.
 *  
 *     You should have received a copy of the Affero General Public License
 *     along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
 *     Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA  02111-1307, USA.
 *     The license is also available at: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html
 *******************************************************************************/
package org.integratedmodelling.api.modelling;

import org.integratedmodelling.api.knowledge.IConcept;
import org.integratedmodelling.api.space.ISpatialExtent;
import org.integratedmodelling.api.time.ITemporalExtent;

/**
 * IObservationTopology refers to a set of concomitant observations of abstracts such as space
 * and time, which constrain any remaining observations. It provides a common base API for both
 * IScale and ITransition; the latter has multiplicity 1 from the point of view of an observer, while
 * the former may have higher order. A IScale can be therefore seen as a sequence of ITransitions. A
 * single ITransition may map to a IScale for a different observer.
 * 
 * @author Ferd
 */
public abstract interface IObservationTopology extends Iterable {

    /**
     * We deal with space and time in all natural systems, so we expose these to ease API use.
     *
     * @return the space, or null
     */
    ISpatialExtent getSpace();

    /**
     * We deal with space and time in all natural systems, so we expose these to ease API use.
     *
     * @return the time, or null
     */
    ITemporalExtent getTime();

    /**
     * Total number of extents available in this Scale. Note that there may be more extents than just space
     * and/or time. Read the non-existing documentation.
     *
     * @return the number of extents for this topology
     */
    int getExtentCount();

    /**
     * Get the n-th extent. Index reflects the scale's inherent sorting and must be stable across
     * instances, i.e. if two scales have the same extents, they must be in the same order, and this
     * also applies to scales that are subsets.
     * 
     * @param index
     * @return the extent in position {@code index}
     */
    IExtent getExtent(int index);

    /**
     * Get the extent that observes the passed domain concept, or null if it does not exist.
     * 
     * @param domainConcept
     * @return the extent that observes the passed concept
     */
    IExtent getExtent(IConcept domainConcept);

    /**
     * Return true only if he scale has > 0 extents and any of them is empty, so that the coverage of any
     * other scale can only be 0.
     *
     * @return true if scale cannot be the context for any observation.
     */
    boolean isEmpty();

}