Joinpoint Inference from Behavioral Specification to Implementation

Aspect-Oriented Programming languages allow pointcut descriptors to directly quantify over the implementation points of a system. Such pointcuts introduce strong mutual coupling between base modules and aspects and are problematic with respect to independent development. This paper introduces a new joinpoint selection mechanism based on state machine specifications. The interfaces of a system include a specification of the effects of method invocations on the state of the module instance. This specification is not defined with respect to potential aspects, but unambiguously describes the observable behavior of the module. We show how a smart joinpoint selection mechanism is able to infer points that might be located deep inside the implementation of a module, given pointcuts that are expressed entirely in terms of its specification elements. We present a tool, the Motorola WEAVR, which implements this technique in a Model-Driven Engineering environment.