org.qi4j.api.common
Annotation Type Optional

@Retention(value=RUNTIME)
@Target(value={PARAMETER,METHOD,FIELD})
@Documented
public @interface Optional

Annotation to denote that something is optional.

• If applied to a method parameter, then the value is allowed to be null. Default is that method parameters have to be non-null.
• If applied to a Property declaration, then the value may be null after construction of the instance, or may be set to null at a later time.
• If applied to an injected member field, it is allowed tha none get injected. For instance, an @Optional @Service would allow a service to not have been declared and the field will be null.

Optionality is not the default in Qi4j, and if injections, property values and parameters in methods are not non-null, the Qi4j runtime will throw an ConstraintViolationException, indicating which field/property/parameter in which composite and mixin the problem has been detected.

Example;

 @Optional @Service
 MyService service;   // If no MyService instance is declared and visible to this service injection point
                      // the 'service' field will be null.

 @Service
 YourService other;   // If no YourService instance is declared and visible to this service injection point
                      // the Qi4j runtime will throw a ConstraintViolationException.