In your code, you want to find out if the instance running your code is an author instance or a publish instance.

Solution

You can use the following code in your components and templates to find out if the running instance is an author or a publish.

DeliveryHttpServletRequest cqRequest = (DeliveryHttpServletRequest) request;

// flag to indicate whether instance is Author or Publish boolean isAuthor = !cqRequest.getCmsService().getDisplayControlSet(cqRequest).equals(DisplayControlSet.SHOW);

// flag to indicate whether instance is in preview/show mode boolean isShowMode = (cqRequest.getCmsService().getDisplayControlSet(cqRequest).equals(DisplayControlSet.SHOWMODE) || "ShowMode".equals(cqRequest.getParameter("Show")) );