Java Aspect Oriented Programming with AspectJ

The Vancouver Software Developers Meetup Group had a great meeting tonight. Dr. Gregor Kiczales of UBC's Software Practices Lab talked about his work on AspectJ. For most people this was an introduction to AOP (Aspect Oriented Programming).

AOP is a very hot term, at least in the Java world right now. I've heard the term batted around for the last couple years now, but I've never gotten around to actually finding out what it really was. All I knew was that Aspects were the next big thing. AOP is supposed to be the biggest revolution in software development practice since the adoption of Object Oriented Programming over Procedural Programming languages. Still - very few people know what it really is.

Dr. Kiczales opened my eyes. Aspects really are a different way of thinking of programming. What they are not is a replacement for Object Oriented Programming. Objects co-exist quite well with AOP.

Also, at theserverside.com there is a link to video of the Aspect Oriented Conference Keynote for more news on what the status of AOP is and where it's going.