/*******************************************************************************
 * Copyright (c) 2000, 2003 IBM Corporation and others.
 * All rights reserved. This program and the accompanying materials 
 * are made available under the terms of the Common Public License v1.0
 * which accompanies this distribution, and is available at
 * http://www.eclipse.org/legal/cpl-v10.html
 * 
 * Contributors:
 *     IBM Corporation - initial API and implementation
 *******************************************************************************/
package org.eclipse.jface.dialogs;


/**
 * Minimal interface to a message provider. 
 * Used for dialog pages which can provide a message with an icon.
 * @since 2.0
 */
public interface IMessageProvider {
	/**
	 * Constant for a regular message (value 0).
	 * <p>
	 * Typically this indicates that the message should be 
	 * shown without an icon.
	 * </p>
	 */
	public final static int NONE = 0;

	/**
	 * 	Constant for an info message (value 1).
	 */
	public final static int INFORMATION = 1;

	/**
	 * 	Constant for a warning message (value 2).
	 */
	public final static int WARNING = 2;

	/**
	 * 	Constant for an error message (value 3).
	 */
	public final static int ERROR = 3;

	/**
	 * Returns the current message for this message provider.
	 * <p>
	 * A message provides instruction or information to the 
	 * user.
	 * </p>
	 * 
	 * @return the message, or <code>null</code> if none
	 */
	public String getMessage();

	/**
	 * Returns a value indicating if the message is a an 
	 * information message, a rning message, or an error message.
	 * <p>
	 * Returns one of <code>NONE</code>, <code>INFORMATION</code>, 
	 * <code>WARNING</code>, or <code>ERROR</code>.
	 * </p>
	 * 
	 * @return the message type
	 */
	public int getMessageType();
}