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FileConnection Optional Package 1.0 Specification
Rev. 1.00 - Final Release

This document, FileConnection Optional Package 1.0 Specification, defines the APIs that comprise the FileConnection optional package for Java 2™ Platform, Micro Edition (J2ME™).

See:
          Description

Packages
javax.microedition.io.file This package describes file system access support based on the Generic Connection Framework.

 

This document, FileConnection Optional Package 1.0 Specification, defines the APIs that comprise the FileConnection optional package for Java 2™ Platform, Micro Edition (J2ME™).

Preface

This document defines a set of APIs known as the FileConnection APIs for Java 2 Platform, Micro Edition (J2ME). These APIs collectively are defined as an optional package.  Optional packages are API sets that may be licensed and added on top of J2ME configuration and profile implementations by vendors independent of the JSR process.  This allows VM implementations to increase the functionality they offer while still providing APIs that are defined as a standard by the Java community.

The FileConnection APIs were developed by as part of JSR 75.  There is no dependency of these FileConnection APIs upon any other APIs produced in JSR 75, and the FileConnection APIs can be licensed and packaged separately from any other J2ME configuration, profile, or optional package. 

This document and all associated documents are subject to the terms of the JCP agreements (i.e. JSPA and/or IEPA), available at http://www.jcp.org. The version of the Java Community Process (JCP) procedures followed is version 2.1, dated July 10, 2001.

Document Conventions

Definitions

This document uses definitions based upon those specified in IETF RFC 2119 (See http://www.ietf.org).

Table 2 Specification Terms

Term Definition
MUST The associated definition is an absolute requirement of this specification.
MUST NOT The definition is an absolute prohibition of this specification.
SHOULD Indicates a recommended practice.  There may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances to ignore this recommendation, but the full implications must be understood and carefully weighed before choosing a different course.
SHOULD NOT Indicates a non-recommended practice.  There may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances when the particular behavior is acceptable or even useful, but the full implications should be understood and the case carefully weighed before implementing any behavior described with this label.
MAY Indicates that an item is truly optional.

Formatting Conventions

This specification used the following formatting conventions.

Table 3 Formatting Conventions

Convention Description
Courier Used in all Java code including keywords, data types, constants, method names, variables, class names, and interface names.
Italic Used for emphasis and to signify the first use of a term.

Overview

The primary goal of the FileConnection APIs is to provide access to file systems on devices and/or mounted memory cards. File system connectivity through the Generic Connection Framework may be supported by an implementation if the target device has the necessary underlying operating system and hardware support for file systems. Connections to a file system may be opened to file systems located either on memory cards or in a device’s memory, depending on device and operating system limitations.   The types of memory cards that contain file systems and could be supported include:

Applicable Platform

CLDC 1.0 is the minimum required platform for this API set. The APIs in this package only depends on APIs required by the CLDC 1.0 API set. That allows the FileConnection APIs to be deployed as an optional API package on any J2ME profile that supports CLDC 1.0 or higher.

Specification Requirements

This section lists explicit requirements of this specification. Implementations of the FileConnection API must follow these requirements. Profiles including this FileConnection API package may require additional requirements above and beyond the ones listed here.

Compliant FileConnection API implementations:

Package Discovery

Because of its optional nature, this package of APIs may not always be available on every platform. Each profile and platform may have their own methods for J2ME package discovery as there is no universal method existing at this time.  An additional method for package discovery of the FileConnection APIs is by using a system properties query. To discover this package, call System.getProperty with a key of microedition.io.file.FileConnection.version. If the API is present, the value returned is the version of the API (e.g. "1.0"). If the API is not present then the key is also not present and null is returned.

System Properties Supported

In addition to the system property  microedition.io.file.FileConnection.version as defined above, FileConnection implementations must also support the system property file.separator.  The file.separator property returns a string representing the file separator character(s) for the underlying platform.   For example, "\" would be returned on a Windows OS based platform, and "/" would be returned on a Unix system.

Security

It is the responsibility of the J2ME platform that the FileConnection APIs are deployed on to provide a security model supporting the security of the File Connection APIs. Specifically:

The implementation of the security model is left up to the including profile or platform. 

If the including profile is MIDP 2.0 (as defined by JSR 118), then included with this specification is an addendum outlining a Recommended Practice for using the FileConnection APIs within the MIDP 2.0 security model.  That addendum can be found here.

Additional Notes


Final Release
Rev. 1.00

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