Extension Naming

Extension naming plays an important role in how the extension is exposed within Rexster. Extension names are defined through the ExtensionNaming annotation which applies to a class. The annotation takes two parameters: the namespace and name. Consider the following example:

@ExtensionNaming(name = "myextension", namespace = "ns")

The namespace specifies the “package” within which the extension will serve and really behaves as a means for organizing common extensions. If the namespace is not specified, it will be defaulted to the “global” namespace which is specified as “g”. Therefore, the following annotations are equivalent:

@ExtensionNaming(name = "myextension", namespace = "g")
@ExtensionNaming(name = "myextension")

The name parameter refers to the name of the extension itself. The name should be unique within the namespace. Rexster will not complain of naming collisions, so therefore it is important to examine both the approach to naming as well as the configuration within Rexster of individual extensions per graph.

The values supplied to the @ExtensionName annotation directly define the the extension URI given a particular extension point. Therefore, assuming a particular graph configured an extension with the following @ExtensionNaming annotation:

@ExtensionNaming(name = "myextension", namespace = "ns")

The above annotation would expose that extension on the following base URIs depending upon the extension point:

# graph extension point
http://{base}/{graph}/ns/myextension

# vertex extension point
http://{base}/{graph}/vertices/{id}/ns/myextension

# edge extension point
http://{base}/{graph}/edges/{id}/ns/myextension

It is possible to apply the same @ExtensionNaming annotation to multiple classes. If this approach is taken, it is only necessary to take care in defining the extension methods to avoid naming collisions which will not be resolved in a predictable manner. For example, the code snippets below are adapted from the Ping Extension in the Sample Kibbles project:

@ExtensionNaming(namespace = "tp", name = "ping")
public class PingExtension extends AbstractRexsterExtension {

    @ExtensionDefinition(extensionPoint = ExtensionPoint.GRAPH)
    @ExtensionDescriptor(description = "a simple ping extension.")
    public ExtensionResponse evaluatePing(@RexsterContext RexsterResourceContext context,
                                          @RexsterContext Graph graph,
                                          @ExtensionRequestParameter(name = "reply", description = "a value to reply with") String reply) {
        Map<String, String> map = new HashMap<String, String>();
        map.put("ping", reply);
        return ExtensionResponse.ok(map);
    }
}

@ExtensionNaming(namespace = "tp", name = "ping")
public class PingAddOnExtension extends AbstractRexsterExtension {

    @ExtensionDefinition(extensionPoint = ExtensionPoint.GRAPH, path = "pong")
    @ExtensionDescriptor(description = "a simple ping extension.")
    public ExtensionResponse evaluatePing(@RexsterContext RexsterResourceContext context,
                                          @RexsterContext Graph graph,
                                          @ExtensionRequestParameter(name = "reply", description = "a value to reply with") String reply) {
        Map<String, String> map = new HashMap<String, String>();
        map.put("ping-add-on", reply);
        return ExtensionResponse.ok(map);
    }
}

Note that both classes have the same @ExtensionNaming annotation, where the namespace is tp and the name is ping. The first class, PingExtension, will respond to requests at:

http://localhost:8182/graph/tp/ping

and the second will respond to requests at:

http://localhost:8182/graph/tp/ping/pong

It is also important to remember that both classes must be listed in the com.tinkerpop.rexster.extension.RexsterExtension file in META-INF/services. Read more about Deploying an Extension in regards to this issue.

Please refer to the Rexster Configuration section for explanation as to how extensions can be configured to work with graphs given the name and namespace parameters on the @ExtensionNaming annotation.