The definitive (and only) introduction to Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP) using Eclipse and ASpectJ.

Adrian Colyer is a Senior Technical Staff Member at IBM, the leader of the AspectJ Eclipse project, and co-founder of the AspectJ Development Tools (AJDT) for Eclipse project.

PrefaceAspect-oriented programming grew out of research at the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) during the 1990's. The first paper to use the term was aptly titled "Aspect-Oriented Programming" (Kicz97), and published in June of 1997. The first public release of AspectJ was in March of 1998, almost seven years ago. Interest in aspect-oriented programming (AOP) and in AspectJ has been growing steadily ever since.We still recall the excitement of seeing our first aspect-oriented programs run - it felt like magic! Today, we spend our time both developing the tools needed for aspect-oriented programming with AspectJ, and applying those tools to real-world problems. In the course of our work, we've had the privilege to introduce the ideas of aspect-oriented programming to many developers, architects, and executives. We've learnt that seeing AspectJ in use is a vital part of understanding these new ideas. For this reason, when we talk to people about AOP, we also show what it's like to work with an aspect-oriented program using the Eclipse AspectJ Development Tools (AJDT). AJDT helps to visualize the behaviour of AspectJ programs and reinforces understanding in a way that words alone cannot achieve.Our goal for this book is to teach you everything you need to understand aspect-oriented programming and to apply it successfully on your own projects. To that end, we'll be introducing the concepts of AOP, the AspectJ language, and the AspectJ Development Tools for Eclipse, in a single integrated package. We hope that as you work through the examples in the book, you will come to share our excitement at all that AOP has to offer. AcknowledgementsWe would like to thank the PARC team that created AspectJ, and especially those that we have had a chance to work with personally on the AspectJ project: Gregor Kiczales, Jim Hugunin, Erik Hilsdale, Mik Kersten, and Wes Isberg. Mik Kersten has been involved in the development of AJDT since its inception and has made great contributions to both the implementation and the vision of what aspect-oriented development support in an IDE should be. Julie Waterhouse has contributed to the development of AJDT since its very first release. Ron Bodkin helped to organise the first AOP workshop in IBM Hursley that helped us build the initial business case for our investment in AOP.We also thank all of the supporters and users of AspectJ and AJDT, your involvement with the project has been a crucial part of what AspectJ is today. Thank you too to the reviewers and editors for making this a much better book than it would otherwise be.Adrian thanks the IBM management team for showing enough belief in his crazy ideas to let him build a team and go after them. Most of all, he thanks his family: Sara, Rebecca, Elliott, and Derwent, for allowing him the time to work on this project. Like I didn't have enough to do already!Andy thanks the Hursley AOSD team for helping us build a development tool worth writing about: Sian Whiting, Matt Chapman, Helen Hawkins and Luzius Meisser. Most of all he thanks Julie for supporting him whilst writing this book and even reviewing some of the text when she had no idea what aspects were.George would like to thank Adrian, Andy, Matthew, Sian, Helen, Matt and Luzius for putting up with him on a daily basis. Thanks also go out to the AspectJ team for their intelligence, good humour and, of course, for creating something truly exceptional. An extra special debt of gratitude is owed to the very wonderful Katy, Eleanor and Dylan who put up with so much during the making of this book. I don't know where I would be without you.Matthew would like to thank Adrian for his visionary leadership of the AOSD team and for inviting him to join it. He has learned so much in the last two years and thanks the whole team for their