Carlos wrote a very interesting post about meta tags (the XDoclet-ish
ones). I really don't see a problem with them and AOP, because you can
define very precise pointcuts with tags. Using the common regular
expression pattern to define pointcuts can lead to some mistakes (and
end up not picking the right pointcut, or, even worse, being more
abrangent than you wanted it to on pointcut selection).
As Carlos said, there's nothing to stop you from creating a doclet that
understands those meta tags and documents them on a nifty series of
HTML files, together with your regular dose of javadoc. You don't even
need support from an IDE to see what's going on. For example, suppose
you have created some wicked cool caching aspect that you applied
everywhere, ruthlessly. Oops. now the cache is taking up a lot of
memory. "But where did I put those meta tags again!?"
Well, simple, fire up the doclet and have it document it for you. Or,
if you don't want to use any tools, at all, check the source for
SourceFileMetaDataCompiler from AspectWerkz, put it to run on a decent
debugger, and with the right expression evaluated (you have an
expression evaluator in your debugger, don't you? :), you can get the
whole meta-data graphl, and ask it where's the tag applied. Just a
simple while loop should do the trick.
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