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org.aspectj/docs/developer/IDE.md

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Setting up an AspectJ development environment

by Alexander Kriegisch, 2021-08-05

AspectJ, being an Eclipse project, can of course be used in the Eclipse IDE for Java developers, if you also install the AspectJ Development Tools (AJDT). IntelliJ IDEA also offers AspectJ and Spring AOP support. Regarding build tools, there are AspectJ plugins for Maven, Gradle and Ant.

Of course, you can use and other IDE and build tool or simply use your trusted text editor of choice and compile using the AspectJ Compiler ajc from the command line.

Please refer to the AspectJ Development Environment Guide for more details about on-board AspectJ tools, such as ajc (compiler), ajdoc (aspect-enriched Javadoc), aj (load-time weaving helper), AspectJ Browser (simple visualisation tool for cross-cutting aspect structure) as well as basic information about load-time weaving configuration and the built-in Ant task for AspectJ.

IDE support

We are going to focus on the two IDEs the author of this document is acquainted with, Eclipse and IntelliJ IDEA. That does not mean that others such as NetBeans or the increasingly popular editor-on-steroids Visual Studio Code might not also be excellent choices, but I simply do not know them, sorry.

Eclipse

If you install AspectJ Development Tools (AJDT), you can use AspectJ in the Eclipse Java IDE. For the last few years, AJDT has rather been kept alive than actively developed, but still it works nicely for the usual tasks, such as writing aspects in both native and annotation-style syntax, viewing cross-references between aspects and Java code, applying all sorts of weaving strategies (compile-time weaving, post-compile binary weaving, load-time weaving) and with an additional m2e (Maven to Eclipse) connector also for importing and refreshing from projects using AspectJ Maven Plugin.

AspectJ Development Tools (AJDT)

Use an update sites corresponding to your Eclipse version (minimal version listed):

Maven to Eclipse (m2e) connector

The connector between AspectJ Maven Plugin and AJDT has not been maintained by the AspectJ team for some years, but there is a fairly up-to-date fork by Miika Vesti (joker1) with the following update sites:

IntelliJ IDEA

IDEA is a commercial IDE by JetBrains, which also has a free Community Edition. The author of this guide uses a complementary Ultimate Edition provided by JetBrains (thank you!), because he is an active open source developer (ask them if you are eligible, too). If you want to use the Ultimate Edition for commercial purposes, however, of course you need to buy it. According to this resource, the AspectJ plugin is for the Ultimate Edition only, so probably the plugin is not going to work in the Community Edition. But if you are using AspectJ in your daytime job, probably you use the Ultimate Edition anyway.

Make sure that the following plugins are active:

  • AOP Pointcut Language (bundled): basic AspectJ and Spring AOP pointcut syntax support (annotation style)
  • AspectJ (marketplace, author JetBrains): native AspectJ support

If the Maven support bundled into IntelliJ IDEA is active as well, Maven projects using the AspectJ Maven Plugin will also be imported correctly. I never tested with any of the Gradle plugins or the AspectJ Ant task because I am a Maven user, so please try for yourself if those combinations are supported.

Build tools

Maven

If you want to build your AspectJ projects with Maven, use AspectJ Maven Plugin by AspectJ.dev, artifact ID dev.aspectj:aspectj-maven-plugin. It is a fork of the original plugin by MojoHaus, which was inactive for 3.5 years and only recently (2021-07-30) had a new release. Because the AspectJ.dev version (maintained by AspectJ contributor Alexander Kriegisch) has more features, we recommend using it instead of the original for original’s sake.

Gradle

In contrast to Maven, there is no de-facto standard build plugin for Gradle, but a bunch of more or less well-maintained plugins with a more or less complete feature set. I am not a Gradle user, but when answering related questions on StackOverflow, I got the impression that Freefair by Lars Grefer is the one I want to recomment because of its good documentation, active development and feature set. It could well be or become for the Gradle ecosystem what AspectJ Maven is for the Maven one. At the time of writing this, the most recent milestone is 6.1.0-m3.

Ant

As mentioned in the introduction, AspectJ features its own Ant task, which is described in this chapter of the Development Environment Guide.

Command line

If you wish to install AspectJ in a separate directory and use it from the command line without any extra build tools, feel free to download the AspectJ installer. It is and executable JAR installer. It requires Java and possibly admin rights, if e.g. under Windows you want to install AspectJ to C:/Program Files/AspectJ. You execute it from a command prompt via java -jar installer-<version>.jar and select your installation options. Then you add <ASPECTJ_HOME>/bin to your path and are good to go. You can now call tools like the Aspectj compiler ajc, the AspectJ documentation generator ajdoc (similar to Javadoc) or the AspectJ Browser ajbrowser from the command line.

You can find older installer versions until 1.9.6 on the AspectJ website, more recent ones are currently being hosted on the AspectJ.dev website.

Biased recommendation

Feel free to be skeptical, because the author has both IDE and build tool biases, but I am recommending Maven as a build tool, AspectJ Maven as a build plugin and then either of Eclipse or IDEA as integrated development environments (IDEs). Why? Because Maven + (Eclipse or IDEA) probably has the most complete tooling and best end-to-end user experience for AspectJ developers. Because I am also by far the most active AspectJ and Spring AOP supporter on StackOverflow, you also have better chances to receive spot-on answers than if e.g. you ask why your Ant or Gradle build does not work so nicely in NetBeans or VS Code. But by all means, please do choose whichever combination of tools is the prescribed standard in your work environment or simply your personal pereference. I believe that diversity is good. 🙂