001/*
002 * Copyright 2002-2017 the original author or authors.
003 *
004 * Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
005 * you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
006 * You may obtain a copy of the License at
007 *
008 *      https://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
009 *
010 * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
011 * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
012 * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
013 * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
014 * limitations under the License.
015 */
016
017package org.springframework.beans.factory;
018
019import org.springframework.beans.BeansException;
020
021/**
022 * Defines a factory which can return an Object instance
023 * (possibly shared or independent) when invoked.
024 *
025 * <p>This interface is typically used to encapsulate a generic factory which
026 * returns a new instance (prototype) of some target object on each invocation.
027 *
028 * <p>This interface is similar to {@link FactoryBean}, but implementations
029 * of the latter are normally meant to be defined as SPI instances in a
030 * {@link BeanFactory}, while implementations of this class are normally meant
031 * to be fed as an API to other beans (through injection). As such, the
032 * {@code getObject()} method has different exception handling behavior.
033 *
034 * @author Colin Sampaleanu
035 * @since 1.0.2
036 * @see FactoryBean
037 */
038public interface ObjectFactory<T> {
039
040        /**
041         * Return an instance (possibly shared or independent)
042         * of the object managed by this factory.
043         * @return the resulting instance
044         * @throws BeansException in case of creation errors
045         */
046        T getObject() throws BeansException;
047
048}