Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP)

Definition - What does Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP) mean?

Aspect-oriented programming (AOP) is a programming paradigm that isolates the supporting functions from the main program’s business logic.

AOP includes programming methods and tools supporting modularization of concerns at the source code level, but it may also refer to the entire software engineering discipline.

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Techopedia explains Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP)

The loss of modularity occurs at the intersection between concerns, and modularity is returned using AOP. This process of intersection, also known as weaving, occurs at build or runtime.

Weaving helps in a number of processes, such as:

Replacing method bodies with new implementations
Inserting code before and after method calls
Implementing variable reads and writes
Associating new states and behaviors with existing classes

AOP logic is implemented in an aspect class independent of later-augmented classes. Once implemented, it can be attached to any library class without aspect class awareness.