Missing VirtualFile::isFile?

[alesj]

What was the reason again the we don't have VirtualFile::isFile method?

OK, VirtualFile::isLeaf makes complete sense,
as you would like to diff jars vs. plain files.

But having VirtualFile::isFile would be useful.
My use case would be 'hasBeenModified' / hot deployment,
where in the case of (isFile == true) I wouldn't go into
the file even though it would be 'isLeaf == false' (the file is a jar).

Or is true/false isFile too narrow for other types of VirtualFileHandler.
e.g. Memort, Assembled, ...
And would getType make a better fit?
e.g. FILE, DIRECTORY, NONE, ...

[starksm64]

The reasoning was that it was too much of a file system notion that did not have a useful meaning in general while isLeaf does. Why would hotdeployment not check a jar when it would check the corresponding unpacked form of the jar as a directory?

The thing we did consider was an isArchive notion for a compressed directory.

[alesj]

The reasoning was that it was too much of a file system notion that did not have a useful meaning in general while isLeaf does.

Sure.
But I'm saying that only isLeaf is not enough.
See the usage in next paragraph.

Why would hotdeployment not check a jar when it would check the corresponding unpacked form of the jar as a directory?

I'm not saying you wouldn't check it.

There is just no need to go and check the META-INF/*.xml changes,
since the change would already reflect on the root's lastModifiedTime.
But in order to know not to go 'in', is the isFile/isArchive directive.

The thing we did consider was an isArchive notion for a compressed directory.

JarHandler/ZipContextHandler::isArchive==true, everybody else == false?

[starksm64]

"alesj" wrote:

JarHandler/ZipContextHandler::isArchive==true, everybody else == false?

Yes, but there could be other archive schemes in the future like tar.

[dmlloyd]

In VFS3, VFS doesn't know (or care) if a file is an archive, unless a deployer has mounted it. VFS3's "isLeaf()" is deprecated and just returns "! isDirectory()". However, isDirectory() only returns true if the entry is known to be a directory; a false value might mean that yes it's a directory but it's not accessible for some reason (permissions etc.). So I think I will add an isFile() method and make isLeaf() call that instead... or maybe simply remove isLeaf() altogether.

A getType() would be the best API of all, but Java gives us no way to guarantee we have the right answer in a consistent and race-free manner. Maybe with JDK7...