#ifndef SERIALIZEIF_H_
#define SERIALIZEIF_H_

#include <framework/returnvalues/HasReturnvaluesIF.h>

/**
 * \defgroup serialize Serialization
 * Contains serialisation services.
 */

/**
 * An interface for alle classes which require translation of objects data into data streams and vice-versa.
 *
 * If the target architecture is little endian (ARM), any data types created might
 * have the wrong endiness if they are to be used for the FSFW.
 * there are three ways to retrieve data out of a buffer to be used in the FSFW to use regular aligned (big endian) data.
 * This can also be applied to uint32_t and uint64_t:
 *
 *   1. Use the @c AutoSerializeAdapter::deSerialize function with @c bigEndian = true
 *   2. Perform a bitshift operation
 *   3. @c memcpy can be used when data is little-endian. Otherwise, @c EndianSwapper has to be used.
 *
 * When serializing for downlink, the packets are generally serialized assuming big endian data format
 * like seen in TmPacketStored.cpp for example.
 *
 * \ingroup serialize
 */
class SerializeIF {
public:
	static const uint8_t INTERFACE_ID = CLASS_ID::SERIALIZE_IF;
	static const ReturnValue_t BUFFER_TOO_SHORT = MAKE_RETURN_CODE(1);
	static const ReturnValue_t STREAM_TOO_SHORT = MAKE_RETURN_CODE(2);
	static const ReturnValue_t TOO_MANY_ELEMENTS = MAKE_RETURN_CODE(3);

	virtual ~SerializeIF() {
	}

	virtual ReturnValue_t serialize(uint8_t** buffer, uint32_t* size,
			const uint32_t max_size, bool bigEndian) const = 0;

	virtual uint32_t getSerializedSize() const = 0;

	virtual ReturnValue_t deSerialize(const uint8_t** buffer, int32_t* size,
			bool bigEndian) = 0;

};

#endif /* SERIALIZEIF_H_ */