I've read a couple of threads on this and not come up with an answer. My interface contains the following....
Firstly, there is no must here so I'm not considering this mandatory.
Additionally, since the description is not in javadoc format I don't consider it to constitute a contract for all implementations. (If I was implementing without the benefit of the source file I wouldn't be able to see this information and so it would have no bearing on my design).
For simplicity, my intention was simply to use a logical delete by marking records deleted, excluding them from reads and searches but leaving the entries in the file.
Has anyone out there failed for taking this approach or feel that this is a contravention of the spec?