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12  * FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public License
13  * version 2 for more details (a copy is included in the LICENSE file that
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24 
25 /*
26  * This file is available under and governed by the GNU General Public
27  * License version 2 only, as published by the Free Software Foundation.
28  * However, the following notice accompanied the original version of this
29  * file:
30  *
31  * Written by Doug Lea with assistance from members of JCP JSR-166
32  * Expert Group and released to the public domain, as explained at
33  * http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
34  */
35 
36 package java.util;
37 
38 // BEGIN android-note
39 // removed link to collections framework docs
40 // END android-note
41 
42 /**
43  * A collection designed for holding elements prior to processing.
44  * Besides basic {@link Collection} operations, queues provide
45  * additional insertion, extraction, and inspection operations.
46  * Each of these methods exists in two forms: one throws an exception
47  * if the operation fails, the other returns a special value (either
48  * {@code null} or {@code false}, depending on the operation).  The
49  * latter form of the insert operation is designed specifically for
50  * use with capacity-restricted {@code Queue} implementations; in most
51  * implementations, insert operations cannot fail.
52  *
53  * <table class="striped">
54  * <caption>Summary of Queue methods</caption>
55  *  <thead>
56  *  <tr>
57  *    <td></td>
58  *    <th scope="col" style="font-weight:normal; font-style:italic">Throws exception</th>
59  *    <th scope="col" style="font-weight:normal; font-style:italic">Returns special value</th>
60  *  </tr>
61  *  </thead>
62  *  <tbody>
63  *  <tr>
64  *    <th scope="row">Insert</th>
65  *    <td>{@link #add(Object) add(e)}</td>
66  *    <td>{@link #offer(Object) offer(e)}</td>
67  *  </tr>
68  *  <tr>
69  *    <th scope="row">Remove</th>
70  *    <td>{@link #remove() remove()}</td>
71  *    <td>{@link #poll() poll()}</td>
72  *  </tr>
73  *  <tr>
74  *    <th scope="row">Examine</th>
75  *    <td>{@link #element() element()}</td>
76  *    <td>{@link #peek() peek()}</td>
77  *  </tr>
78  *  </tbody>
79  * </table>
80  *
81  * <p>Queues typically, but do not necessarily, order elements in a
82  * FIFO (first-in-first-out) manner.  Among the exceptions are
83  * priority queues, which order elements according to a supplied
84  * comparator, or the elements' natural ordering, and LIFO queues (or
85  * stacks) which order the elements LIFO (last-in-first-out).
86  * Whatever the ordering used, the <em>head</em> of the queue is that
87  * element which would be removed by a call to {@link #remove()} or
88  * {@link #poll()}.  In a FIFO queue, all new elements are inserted at
89  * the <em>tail</em> of the queue. Other kinds of queues may use
90  * different placement rules.  Every {@code Queue} implementation
91  * must specify its ordering properties.
92  *
93  * <p>The {@link #offer offer} method inserts an element if possible,
94  * otherwise returning {@code false}.  This differs from the {@link
95  * java.util.Collection#add Collection.add} method, which can fail to
96  * add an element only by throwing an unchecked exception.  The
97  * {@code offer} method is designed for use when failure is a normal,
98  * rather than exceptional occurrence, for example, in fixed-capacity
99  * (or &quot;bounded&quot;) queues.
100  *
101  * <p>The {@link #remove()} and {@link #poll()} methods remove and
102  * return the head of the queue.
103  * Exactly which element is removed from the queue is a
104  * function of the queue's ordering policy, which differs from
105  * implementation to implementation. The {@code remove()} and
106  * {@code poll()} methods differ only in their behavior when the
107  * queue is empty: the {@code remove()} method throws an exception,
108  * while the {@code poll()} method returns {@code null}.
109  *
110  * <p>The {@link #element()} and {@link #peek()} methods return, but do
111  * not remove, the head of the queue.
112  *
113  * <p>The {@code Queue} interface does not define the <i>blocking queue
114  * methods</i>, which are common in concurrent programming.  These methods,
115  * which wait for elements to appear or for space to become available, are
116  * defined in the {@link java.util.concurrent.BlockingQueue} interface, which
117  * extends this interface.
118  *
119  * <p>{@code Queue} implementations generally do not allow insertion
120  * of {@code null} elements, although some implementations, such as
121  * {@link LinkedList}, do not prohibit insertion of {@code null}.
122  * Even in the implementations that permit it, {@code null} should
123  * not be inserted into a {@code Queue}, as {@code null} is also
124  * used as a special return value by the {@code poll} method to
125  * indicate that the queue contains no elements.
126  *
127  * <p>{@code Queue} implementations generally do not define
128  * element-based versions of methods {@code equals} and
129  * {@code hashCode} but instead inherit the identity based versions
130  * from class {@code Object}, because element-based equality is not
131  * always well-defined for queues with the same elements but different
132  * ordering properties.
133  *
134  * @since 1.5
135  * @author Doug Lea
136  * @param <E> the type of elements held in this queue
137  */
138 public interface Queue<E> extends Collection<E> {
139     /**
140      * Inserts the specified element into this queue if it is possible to do so
141      * immediately without violating capacity restrictions, returning
142      * {@code true} upon success and throwing an {@code IllegalStateException}
143      * if no space is currently available.
144      *
145      * @param e the element to add
146      * @return {@code true} (as specified by {@link Collection#add})
147      * @throws IllegalStateException if the element cannot be added at this
148      *         time due to capacity restrictions
149      * @throws ClassCastException if the class of the specified element
150      *         prevents it from being added to this queue
151      * @throws NullPointerException if the specified element is null and
152      *         this queue does not permit null elements
153      * @throws IllegalArgumentException if some property of this element
154      *         prevents it from being added to this queue
155      */
add(E e)156     boolean add(E e);
157 
158     /**
159      * Inserts the specified element into this queue if it is possible to do
160      * so immediately without violating capacity restrictions.
161      * When using a capacity-restricted queue, this method is generally
162      * preferable to {@link #add}, which can fail to insert an element only
163      * by throwing an exception.
164      *
165      * @param e the element to add
166      * @return {@code true} if the element was added to this queue, else
167      *         {@code false}
168      * @throws ClassCastException if the class of the specified element
169      *         prevents it from being added to this queue
170      * @throws NullPointerException if the specified element is null and
171      *         this queue does not permit null elements
172      * @throws IllegalArgumentException if some property of this element
173      *         prevents it from being added to this queue
174      */
offer(E e)175     boolean offer(E e);
176 
177     /**
178      * Retrieves and removes the head of this queue.  This method differs
179      * from {@link #poll() poll()} only in that it throws an exception if
180      * this queue is empty.
181      *
182      * @return the head of this queue
183      * @throws NoSuchElementException if this queue is empty
184      */
remove()185     E remove();
186 
187     /**
188      * Retrieves and removes the head of this queue,
189      * or returns {@code null} if this queue is empty.
190      *
191      * @return the head of this queue, or {@code null} if this queue is empty
192      */
poll()193     E poll();
194 
195     /**
196      * Retrieves, but does not remove, the head of this queue.  This method
197      * differs from {@link #peek peek} only in that it throws an exception
198      * if this queue is empty.
199      *
200      * @return the head of this queue
201      * @throws NoSuchElementException if this queue is empty
202      */
element()203     E element();
204 
205     /**
206      * Retrieves, but does not remove, the head of this queue,
207      * or returns {@code null} if this queue is empty.
208      *
209      * @return the head of this queue, or {@code null} if this queue is empty
210      */
peek()211     E peek();
212 }
213