/*
Wotonomy: OpenStep design patterns for pure Java applications.
Copyright (C) 2000 Blacksmith, Inc.

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public
License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either
version 2.1 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This library 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 library; if not, see http://www.gnu.org
*/

package net.wotonomy.web;

import net.wotonomy.foundation.internal.NetworkClassLoader;

/**
 * A pure java implementation that corresponds to the abstract class
 * WORequestHandler.
 *
 * @author michael@mpowers.net
 * @author $Author: cgruber $
 * @version $Revision: 905 $
 */
public abstract class WORequestHandler {
	private NetworkClassLoader loader;

	/**
	 * Default constructor.
	 */
	public WORequestHandler() {
		loader = new NetworkClassLoader(WOApplication.application().getClass().getClassLoader());
	}

	/**
	 * Dispatches the request and returns the response.
	 */
	abstract public WOResponse handleRequest(WORequest aRequest);

	/**
	 * Gets the specified class, loading it if it has not already been loaded or if
	 * it has been modified. Returns null if not found. Because this method is not
	 * in the specification, it has only package access.
	 */
	Class<?> loadClass(String aName) {
		try {
			return loader.loadClass(aName, true);
		} catch (ClassNotFoundException cnfe) {
			return null;
		}
	}

//    void lock ()
//    void unlock ()
}