How do annotations like @Override work internally in Java?

Question

Can anybody explain to me how annotations work internally in java?

I know how we can create custom annotations by using java.lang.annotation library in java. But I s

Answer 1

Here's @Override: http://www.docjar.com/html/api/java/lang/Override.java.html.

There's nothing special about it that differentiates it from an annotation you might write yourself. The interesting bits are in the consumers of the annotations. For an annotation like @Override, that would be in the Java compiler itself, or a static code analysis tool, or your IDE.