/*
 * Hibernate, Relational Persistence for Idiomatic Java
 *
 * Copyright (c) 2010, Red Hat Inc. or third-party contributors as
 * indicated by the @author tags or express copyright attribution
 * statements applied by the authors.  All third-party contributions are
 * distributed under license by Red Hat Inc.
 *
 * This copyrighted material is made available to anyone wishing to use, modify,
 * copy, or redistribute it subject to the terms and conditions of the GNU
 * Lesser General Public License, as published by the Free Software Foundation.
 *
 * 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 GNU Lesser General Public License
 * for more details.
 *
 * You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public License
 * along with this distribution; if not, write to:
 * Free Software Foundation, Inc.
 * 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor
 * Boston, MA  02110-1301  USA
 */
package org.hibernate.metamodel.domain;

Describes an attribute.
Author:
Steve Ebersole/**
 * Describes an attribute.
 *
 * @author Steve Ebersole
 */
public interface Attribute {
	
Retrieve the attribute name.
Returns:
The attribute name./**
	 * Retrieve the attribute name.
	 *
	 * @return The attribute name.
	 */
	public String getName();

	
Retrieve the declaring container for this attribute (entity/component).
Returns:
The attribute container./**
	 * Retrieve the declaring container for this attribute (entity/component).
	 *
	 * @return The attribute container.
	 */
	public AttributeContainer getAttributeContainer();

	
An attribute can be either:

singular - castable to SingularAttribute
plural - castable to PluralAttribute 
Returns:
True if attribute is singular; false if plural./**
	 * An attribute can be either:<ul>
	 * <li>singular - castable to {@link SingularAttribute}</li>
	 * <li>plural - castable to {@link PluralAttribute}
	 * </ul>
	 *
	 * @return True if attribute is singular; false if plural.
	 */
	public boolean isSingular();
}