[aspectj-dev] Runtime processing

[Sam Pullara <sam@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

We have a use case for weaving aspects at runtime, and to that end I 
modified the AjBuildManager with an additional method:

byte[] weaveClassBytes(String className, byte[] classBytes)

In the current case, our system does this:

1) Calls the BuildManager with a normal batchBuild() call that only 
includes the aspects that we are going to add.
2) When our custom classloader loads a new class it calls 
weaveClassBytes() to add in the aspects defined.

Does anyone know if there is a problem with this? It seems to work 
quite well and I can see that it would be possible to make a simple 
launcher that runs programs this way so you could straightforwardly 
instrument a non-aspect aware application with a set of aspects.

As an aside, we have also found that there is a need for resuable 
advice.  Is there a mechanism in AspectJ that I am missing?  For 
instance, I would like to define a pointcut and an advice separately 
and then bind them in a 3rd place, i.e.:

pointcut method() : execution(public void Foo.bar());

advice timeMethod() = Object around() {
	long start = System.currentTimeMillis();
	Object result = proceed();
	System.out.println(System.currentTimeMillis() - start);
	return result;
}

bind timeMethod() : method();

Is there a better way that I am missing?

Sam