Integrating aspect oriented programming into the application server

• US 20080301629A1
• Filed: 05/31/2007
• Published: 12/04/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 05/31/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Red Hat, Inc. (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Red Hat, Inc. (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Inventors: Stark, Scott M.
• Granted Patent: US 8,327,341 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/107
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/24 Object-oriented
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/60 Software deployment

Abstract

A method and apparatus for integrating aspect-oriented programming (AOP) into the deployment layer of an application server. In one embodiment, the method includes analyzing a structure of a deployment within an application server, and translating the deployment from a first form to a second form using results of the analyzing. The method further includes indicating in the deployment that a cross-cutting concern is to be resolved by aspects at runtime.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of a deployment layer, comprising:

analyzing a structure of a deployment within an application server;

translating the deployment from a first form to a second form using results of the analyzing; and

indicating in the deployment that a cross-cutting concern is to be resolved by aspects at runtime.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

using a structure deployer to analyze the structure of the deployment;

using a translation deployer to translate the deployment; and

applying the aspects to at least one of the structure deployer and the translation deployer.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein translating the deployment further comprises:

translating the deployment into a collection of Plain Old Java Objects (POJOs).

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

implementing each of the aspects as a customized plug-in to encapsulate aspect code and specify when to execute the aspect code.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein analyzing a deployment further comprises:

producing a graph of metadata describing dependencies in the deployment.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

sequencing operations performed by deployers of the deployment layer according to a pre-determined ordering sequence.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

implementing the aspects as plug-ins to be dynamically called by deployers of the deployment layer.

8. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

implementing at least one of the aspects as a customized plug-in.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

using a main deployer as a deployment entry point.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein translating the deployment further comprises:

providing the deployment in the second form to a kernel that constructs the deployment at runtime with the aspects.

11. A system comprising:

a deployment layer including a structure deployer to analyze a structure of a deployment, and a translation deployer to translate the deployment from a first form to a second form using results of the structure deployer; and

a repository, coupled to the deployment layer, to store a collection of aspects to resolve a cross-cutting concern in the deployment at runtime.

12. The system of claim 11 wherein operations of the structure deployer and the translation deployer follow a pre-determined order.

13. The system of claim 11 wherein the aspects include customized plug-ins implemented by Plain Old Java Objects (POJOs).

14. The system of claim 11 wherein at least one of the structure deployer and the translation deployer is constructed by the collection of aspects.

15. An article of manufacture, comprising:

a machine-accessible storage medium including data that, when accessed by a machine, cause the machine to perform a method comprising;

analyzing a structure of a deployment of an application server;

translating the deployment from a first form to a second form using results of the analyzing; and

indicating in the deployment that a cross-cutting concern is to be resolved by aspects at runtime.

16. The article of manufacture of claim 15 wherein the method further comprises:

applying the aspects to construct at least one of deployers that perform the analyzing and translating.

17. The article of manufacture of claim 15 wherein translating the deployment further comprises:

translating the deployment into a collection of Plain Old Java Objects (POJOs).

18. The article of manufacture of claim 15 wherein the method further comprises:

implementing at least one of the aspects as a customized plug-in.

19. The article of manufacture of claim 15 wherein analyzing a deployment further comprises:

producing a graph of metadata describing dependencies in the deployment.

20. The article of manufacture of claim 15 wherein the method further comprises:

providing the deployment in the second form to a kernel that constructs the deployment at runtime with the aspects.