/*
 * 
 * LICENSE
 * 
 * Copyright (c) 2000 - 2011 The Legion of the Bouncy Castle Inc.
 * (http://www.bouncycastle.org)
 * 
 * Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this
 * software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the 
 * without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge,
 * publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons
 * to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
 * 
 * The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies
 * or substantial portions of the Software.
 * 
 * THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED,
 * INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR
 * PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE
 * FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR
 * OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER
 * DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
 * 
 */

using System;

namespace Org.BouncyCastle.Utilities
{
	public interface IMemoable
	{
		/// <summary>
		/// Produce a copy of this object with its configuration and in its current state.
		/// </summary>
		/// <remarks>
		/// The returned object may be used simply to store the state, or may be used as a similar object
		/// starting from the copied state.
		/// </remarks>
		IMemoable Copy();

		/// <summary>
		/// Restore a copied object state into this object.
		/// </summary>
		/// <remarks>
		/// Implementations of this method <em>should</em> try to avoid or minimise memory allocation to perform the reset.
		/// </remarks>
		/// <param name="other">an object originally {@link #copy() copied} from an object of the same type as this instance.</param>
		/// <exception cref="InvalidCastException">if the provided object is not of the correct type.</exception>
		/// <exception cref="MemoableResetException">if the <b>other</b> parameter is in some other way invalid.</exception>
		void Reset(IMemoable other);
	}

}

