Programming with Aspectual Components

Karl Lieberherr, Northeastern University
David H. Lorenz, Northeastern University
Mira Mezini, Northeastern University

Aspect-oriented programming (AOP) controls tangling of concerns by isolating aspects that cross-cut each other into building blocks. Component-based programming (CBP) supports software development by isolating reusable building blocks that can be assembled and connected in many different ways. We show how AOP and CBP can be integrated by introducing a new component construct for programming class collaborations, called \emph{aspectual component}. Aspectual components extend adaptive plug-and-play components (AP\&P) with a modification interface that turns them into an effective tool for AOP. A key ingredient of aspectual components is that they are written in terms of a generic data model, called a participant graph, which is later mapped into a data model. We introduce a new property of this map, called \emph{instance-refinement}, to ensure the proper deployment of components. We show how aspectual components can be implemented in Java, and demonstrate that aspectual components improve the AspectJ language for AOP from Xerox PARC.

Technical Report NU-CCS-99-01, College of Computer Science, Northeastern University, March 1999.


NU-CCS-99-01.ps.gz (164k)


@TechReport{Lieberherr:1999:PAC,
  Title       = "Programming with Aspectual Components",
  Author      = "Karl Lieberherr and David~H. Lorenz and Mira Mezini",
  Number      = "{NU-CCS-99-01}",
  Institution = "College of Computer Science, Northeastern University",
  Address     = "Boston, MA 02115",
  Month       = mar,
  Year        = 1999,
  URL         = "\url{http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/lorenz/papers/reports/NU-CCS-99-01.html}",
}

  • For more information about this report see: http://www.ccs.neu.edu/research/demeter/biblio/aspectual-comps.html

    26 citations found. Retrieving documents...
    Lieberherr, K., Lorenz, D. and Mezini, M. Programming with Aspectual Components. Technical Report, NU-CCS-99-01, March 1999. Available at: http://www'ccs'neu'edu/research/demeter/bibli/aspectualcomps. html.

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    Object Confinement in Object Teams --- - Reconciling Encapsulation And   (Correct)

    ....it is argued, that Object Teams also provide strong concepts for encapsulation, which help for modular reasoning about aspect oriented programs developed in this model. 1 Object Teams in a nutshell The Object Teams programming model [7, 14] has its roots in the concept of Aspectual Components [11]. It has gone through several iterations [12, 5, 6, 17] before its current incarnation as ObjectTeams Java, an implementation based on a combination of a modified Java compiler and a runtime system performing load time byte code adaptation using JMangler [10] Object Teams combine the expressive ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. Technical Report, Northeastern University, April 1999.


    Object Con - Nement In Object   (Correct)

    ....it is argued, that Object Teams also provide strong concepts for encapsulation, which help for modular reasoning about aspect oriented programs developed in this model. 1 Object Teams in a nutshell The Object Teams programming model [7, 14] has its roots in the concept of Aspectual Components [11]. It has gone through several iterations [12, 5, 6, 17] before its current incarnation as ObjectTeams Java, an implementation based on a combination of a modi ed Java compiler and a runtime system performing load time byte code adaptation using JMangler [10] Object Teams combine the expressive ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. Technical Report, Northeastern University, April 1999.


    Aspect-Oriented Programming with Jiazzi - Sean Mcdirmid Wilson   (Correct)

    ....Jiazzi s support for AOP is similar to Hyper J [20] where atoms are like hyperslices and compounds are like hypermodules. Linking in Jiazzi and composition in Hyper J serve the same purpose by giving the programmer explicit control over aspect inclusion and configuration. Aspectual components [15] are also adept at modularizing object crosscutting concerns and, like Jiazzi, emphasize modularity to enable separate reasoning about concern implementations. Others have explored the relationship between units and aspects [6] the features described in this paper focus concerns that cross cut ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. 1999.


    Model-View-Controller and Object Teams: - Perfect Match Of   (Correct)

    ....MVC in a more radical way than traditional object oriented techniques do. 3. INTRODUCTION TO OBJECT TEAMS Object Teams is a recent programming model, which combines two concepts for improving modularity: aspects and collaborations. The direct predecessors of Object Teams are Aspectual Components [9] and LAC [5] From this background, Object Teams is a general AOSD approach aiming at a broad range of modularity issues. Before demonstrating the applicability of Object Teams for the MVC architecture, let us brie y show, how the concepts of collaborations and aspects are re ned to teams, roles ....

    ....typos cannot be detected by the compiler. Di erent approaches for building interactive applications have been mentioned in the introduction. A good discussion on this behalf can, e.g. be found in [12] 8. STATUS, SUMMARY AND FUTURE Object Teams [6, 11] have their roots in Aspectual Components [9]. Two prototypical implementations exists. LAC [5] was the rst practical demonstration, that the concepts proposed in [9] can in fact be implemented and operate as expected. After further re nements of concepts and terminology, Object Teams have been implemented on the basis of Ruby [13] This ....

    [Article contains additional citation context not shown here]

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. In Technical Report, Northeastern University, April 1999.


    Modular Verification of - Feature-Oriented Software Models   (Correct)

    ....to implementing that feature. Figure 1 contrasts these two approaches. As with aspects [27] feature oriented designs often divide the implementation of each actor into several fragments that crosscut the modular structure of the design. Modules in such designs are sometimes called collaborations [31], hyperslices [35] refinements [5] or units [16] We will use the term features, but our work should apply to other similar notions of cross cutting. Feature modules have well defined interfaces that permit their composition to build larger designs; they tend, at least in principle, to obey ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. Technical Report NU-CCS99 -01, College of Computer Science, Northeastern University, Mar. 1999.


    Object Teams: Improving Modularity for Crosscutting Collaborations - Herrmann   (Correct)

    ....do f base( g invoke in context 7 else 8 base( invoke unmodified 10 entryHook book; 12 static void setActive (Passenger BonusPassenger p, Team c) 13 f p.myContext = c; g Fig 7. A static entry trigger mechanism. A predecessor of the current model, Aspectual Components [13], made a strict separation between the definition of a collaboration and a connector which binds it to the application. Technically, this distinction is not needed, and in fact we have observed situations, where partial Team definitions with partial bindings are helpful. Thus we allow mixing the ....

    ....been discussed in the introduction and throughout the paper. Let us now focus on a comparison within the field of languages for aspect oriented software development. Object Teams build upon and further develop ideas from the works on Pluggable Composite Adapters (PCAs) 15] Aspectual Components [13], and the language prototype LAC [8] which in turn have their common roots in the work on Adaptive Plug Play Components [14] In the following, we will clearly state the commonalities and differences of Object Teams with these predecessor models as well as with other models for aspect oriented ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. In Technical Report, Northeastern University, Apr. 1999.


    Object Teams: Improving Modularity for Crosscutting Collaborations - Herrmann   (Correct)

    ....g invoke in context 7 else 8 base.entryHook( invoke unmodified 10 entryHook book; 12 static void setActive (Passenger as BonusPassenger p, Team c) 13 f p.myContext = c; g Fig. 8. A static entry trigger mechanism. A predecessor of the current model, Aspectual Components [11], made a strict distinction between the definition of a collaboration and a connector that binds it to the application. Technically, this distinction is not needed, and in fact we have observed situations in which partial Team definitions with partial bindings are helpful. Thus, we allow the ....

    ....data flows enter leave a team. Teams are implicitly activated whenever a control flow enters a Team. 3 Related work Object Teams aim at implementing collaboration based designs [16, 2, 19, 17] They have their roots in Adaptive Plug Play Components [12] PCA [13] and Aspectual Components [11]. They have been influenced by Hyper J [18] with respect to the separation of concern definition and concern composition as well as its capabilities for on demand restructuring. Influence from AspectJ [9] concerns the technique of weaving into existing code. Virtual classes from gbeta and ....

    [Article contains additional citation context not shown here]

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. In Technical Report, Northeastern University, Apr. 1999.


    Composable Designs with UFA - Herrmann (2002)   (Correct)

    ....depends on a seamless embedding into the software life cycle. When striving for an appropriate design notation for AOSD it is important to carefully balance the abstraction required by design with the precision required for implementing a given design. We choose the Aspectual Collaborations model [7, 5] as a basis, which allows separate development of modules comprising sets of collaborating classes and a posteriori integration of such modules. We present UFA (UML for Aspects) as an extension of the UML, which maps these modules to packages in UML. We furthermore focus on multiple levels of ....

    ....towards which the re nement process is optimized. If seamlessness can be shown for one language, but transition to other languages remains dicult, it is still to be shown whether this is a de ciency of the AOD notation or the AOPL. We chose for this work the model of Aspectual Collaborations [7, 5]. This model combines several composition techniques from existing AOPLs. It has been implemented in a language prototype called LAC [5] A Java based compiler is under development. 2.1 From Decomposition to Composition Separation of concerns and decomposition have been guiding principles in ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. In Technical Report, Northeastern University, April 1999.


    Composable Designs with UFA - Herrmann (2002)   (Correct)

    ....on a seamless embedding into the software life cycle. When striving for an appropriate design notation for AOSD it is important to carefully balance the abstraction required by design with the precision required for implementing a given design. We choose the Aspectual Collaborations model [7, 5] as a basis, which allows separate development of modules comprising sets of collaborating classes and a posteriori integration of such modules. We present UFA (UML for Aspects) as an extension of the UML, which maps these modules to packages in UML. We furthermore focus on multiple levels of ....

    ....towards which the refinement process is optimized. If seamlessness can be shown for one language, but transition to other languages remains di#cult, it is still to be shown whether this is a deficiency of the AOD notation or the AOPL. We chose for this work the model of Aspectual Collaborations [7, 5]. This model combines several composition techniques from existing AOPLs. It has been implemented in a language prototype called LAC [5] A Java based compiler is under development. 2.1 From Decomposition to Composition Separation of concerns and decomposition have been guiding principles in ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. In Technical Report, Northeastern University, April 1999.


    Applying Aspect-Oriented Programming Ideas in a - Component Based Context (2001)   (Correct)

    ....different possibilities to modularize crosscutting concerns in our component based context. The first solution consists of using a new component model that allows a component to describe adaptations in other components. Prof Lieberherr and others present a concrete proposal for such a component [4]. They call these components aspectual components. They propose to have a new type of interface that allows components to describe adaptations independent of the concrete components that will be adapted. At composition time, special compositions connect the adaptations with the concrete ....

    Lieberherr, K., Lorenz, D. and Mezini, M. Programming with Aspectual Components. Technical Report, NU-CCS-99-01, March 1999. Available at: http://www.ccs.neu.edu/research/demeter/biblio/aspectual-comps.html.


    Separating Concerns in a High-Level Component-Based Context - Wim Vanderperren Bart (2002)   (Correct)

    ....different possibilities to modularise crosscutting concerns in our component based context. The first solution consists of using a new component model that allows a component to describe adaptations in other components. Prof Lieberherr and others present a concrete proposal for such a component [3]. They call these components aspectual components. They propose to have a new type of interface that allows components to describe adaptations independent of the concrete components that will be adapted. At composition time, special compositions connect the adaptations with the concrete ....

    Lieberherr, K., Lorenz, D. and Mezini, M. Programming with Aspectual Components. Technical Report, NU-CCS-99-01, March 1999. Available at: http://www.ccs.neu.edu/research/demeter/biblio/aspectualcomps. html.


    The Influence of Software Module Systems on Modular.. - Li, Fisler, Krishnamurthi (2002)   (Correct)

    ....designs realign the module boundaries so that all of the code pertaining to a single operation lies in the same module; the modules therefore cross cut actors. Researchers have proposed feature oriented modules under many names (refinements [6] units [15] aspects [23] collaborations [27], hyper slices [28] and others) some have spoken of feature oriented designs (or feature engineering) in more general terms [32] Ongoing research on feature oriented modules shows that they simplify key software engineering problems such as configurability, maintainability, and evolution [3, ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. Technical Report NU-CCS-99-01, College of Computer Science, Northeastern University, Mar. 1999.


    Project Summary - For   (Correct)

    ....in the account objects. Doing the computation with small objects as given in the collaborations, seems to result in the desired efficiency provided the synchronization of the many small business objects can be solved efficiently. Collaborations can also be of a rewriting nature as described in [LLM99] Those collaborations can easily express aspects in a similar way as they are expressed in aspect oriented programming with AspectJ [Tea99] We propose to implement those rewriting collaborations and compare the resulting system with AspectJ from Xerox PARC. This work will include a compiler for ....

    Karl Lieberherr, David Lorenz, and Mira Mezini. Programming with Aspectual Components. Technical Report NU-CCS-99-01, College of Computer Science, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, March 1999.


    Towards Multi-Paradigm Software Development - Vranic (2001)   (Correct)

    .... of methods for a given message from di erent subjects supported in SOP are components in the AOP sense since they can be well localized in a generalized procedure (routine) But this seem to be a more general issue, since it applies to AspectJ too, named aspectual paradox by Liebrherr et al. LLM99] an aspect described in AspectJ, the Xerox PARC s AOP language, which has a construct for specifying aspects, is by de nition no longer an aspect, as it has just been captured in a (new kind of) generalized routine . It is worth mentioning, as Czarnecki [Cza98] observed, that SOP is close to ....

    Karl Lieberherr, David Lorenz, and Mira Mezini. Programming with Aspectual Components. Technical Report NU-CCS-99-01, College of Computer Science, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, March 1999. Available at [Dem].


    Lightweight Analysis of Operational Specifications Using.. - Dillon, Stirewalt   (Correct)

    ....to determine how to optimize the analyzer. It would be difficult to prove (or even rigorously argue) that the generation algorithm was correct. Another avenue to explore for acheiving efficiency without sacrificing transparency is to use aspect oriented programming [12] or aspectual components [13] to weave the evaluation of rules into custom algorithms that manipulate data structures containing the premise steps. These approaches facilitate transparency but lack a formal basis in which to prove correctness. Our formalization of inference graphs allows a proof that this abstraction is ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. Technical Report NU-CCS-99-01, College of Computer Science, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, March 1999.


    JAC Milestone 2001 - Seinturier, Pawlak, Duchien,  (2001)   (Correct)

    ....of an aspect to an application (the aspect is said to be woven) is one of them. Several approaches exist: AspectJ [KHH 01] which is a general language for AOP, the composition lter object model [BA01] where aspects are de ned as lters applied upon application objects, aspectual components [LLM99] that de ne patterns of interaction with roles and connectors to map these roles to application objects, subject oriented programming [HO93] OKH 95] which decomposes an application into subjects and provides composition rules to recompose them, domain speci c languages to de ne crosscutting ....

    ....only crosscuts the application, but may also crosscut others aspects. Indeed, aspects may not be orthogonal to each others. We call this issue the inter aspects composition aspect. Some solutions exist, e.g. precedence rules in AspectJ [KHH 01] or composed connectors in aspectual components [LLM99] see section 6 for a discussion of these features) but as far as we know, this 1 is still an open issue for the AOP community. Most of the time aspect programmers still have to invent some ad hoc means to handle it. This problem deeply a ects the potential power of AOP by making aspects less ....

    [Article contains additional citation context not shown here]

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. Technical Report NU-CCS-99-01, Northeastern University's College of Computer Science, April 1999.


    Grouping Objects using Aspect-Oriented Adapters - Hanenberg, Unland (2001)   (Correct)

    ....realized on object level using reflection there is no static type checking available. So the developer has to be sure, that the interface of the adapted object really fulfills the signatures specified in the concrete adapter. This presented approach can be used for composing aspectual components [6], which represent aspects whose interfaces have to be adapted to let them interact with their environment. In the future we will examine, how such components can be realized in existing general purpose aspect languages. ....

    Lieberherr, K., Lorenz, D., Mezini, M.: Programming with Aspectual Components , Technical Report, NU-CCS-99-01, Northeastern University, Boston, 1999


    Aspectifying Constraints in Model-Integrated Computing - Gray, Bapty, Neema (2000)   (Correct)

    ....aspects disappear from the resultant object graph after weaving is completed. The only noticeable change in the object graph is the addition of the constraint aspects. The Adaptive Programming community has recently addressed issues concerning the separation of aspects from their join points [Lieberherr et al. 99] In their approach, called aspectual components, a definition that is separate from the aspect description is used to describe the assembly of join points. We would like to explore further this idea with our own language so that our constraint aspects are more generic and can be reused in ....

    Karl Lieberherr, David Lorenz and Mira Mezini, "Programming with Aspectual Components," NU-CCS-99-01, College of Computer Science, Northeastern University, March 1999.


    Conquering Aspects with Caesar - Mezini, Ostermann (2003)   (3 citations)  Self-citation (Mezini)   (Correct)

    ....prerequisite for reusable and extensible software. On contrary, Caesar o#ers an alternative to open classes that is even more powerful and does not violate independent extensibility. Adaptive Plug and Play Components (APPCs) 10] and their aspect oriented variant of Aspectual Components [8] are related to our work in that both approaches support the definition of multi abstraction components aspects and have a vague definition of required and provided interfaces. However, the latter feature was not well integrated with the type system. Recognizing this deficiency, the successor ....

    ....improvement over all three models, as far as support for multi abstraction aspects is concerned. Due to the lack of a CI notion, connectors and adapters in APPC, Aspectual Components, and PCA models are bound to a fixed implementation of an aspect and cannot be reused. In addition, 10] and [8] rely on a dedicated mapping sublanguage that is less powerful than our object oriented wrappers with wrapper recycling. Finally, the lack of the notion of virtual types is another drawback of these approaches as compared to the work presented here. Delegation layers [13] are an approach to ....

    K. Lieberherr, D. Lorenz, and M. Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. Technical Report NU-CCS-99-01, March 1999.


    Combining Composition Styles in the Evolvable Language LAC - Herrmann, Mezini (2001)   Self-citation (Mezini)   (Correct)

    ....of broken modularity, partly, they utilize incompatible concepts for similar problems. The great merger has not happened. While the two leading language implementations, AspectJ and Hyper J are elaborated up to a point, where moving towards each other seems to be impossible, a proposal dated 1999 [6] had not been implemented to date, which has the capability to combine some ideas from di erent groups of researchers. The model is called Aspectual Components. This paper presents a light weight implementation of Aspectual Components, by which the design of this model is re ned and open design ....

    ....of this model is re ned and open design decisions are cast into this discussion. We implemented LAC as a small extension to the interpreted language Lua [4] Thus, LAC stands for Lua Aspectual Components. In section 2, we will present the conceptual elements of Aspectual Components according to [6], supplemented by some considerations that arose while implementing LAC. Section 3 presents the internal design of LAC, introducing concepts like facet compound objects and run time Submission for ASoC Workshop at ICSE 2001. weaving as a special style of meta programming. This might lay the ....

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    Karl Lieberherr, David Lorenz, and Mira Mezini. Programming with aspectual components. In Technical Report, Northeastern University, April 1999.


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