aspectj pointcut with annotation parameters

Question

I am using aspectj to intercept methods that are annotated with @Profile(description="something")

@Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
@Target(ElementType.METHOD)
public @interface Profile {
    public String description() default "";
}

@Around("com.merc.aop.ctw.aspect.PointcutDefinitions.logAnnotatedMethods(profile)")
public Object profile(ProceedingJoinPoint pjp, Profile profile) throws Throwable {
    ....
}

@Pointcut("@annotation(com.merc.annotations.Profile)")
protected void logAnnotatedMethods(Profile profile) {
}

But I get the following error msg while compileing using AJC

formal unbound in pointcut 

Answer 1

@Pointcut("@annotation(com.merc.annotations.Profile)")
protected void logAnnotatedMethods(Profile profile) {
}

This is not correct, @annotation() wants a parameter name, not a parameter type.

If your class is compiled with debug code, the pointcut parameter must have the same name as the method parameter, if not, you need to either rely on the parameter types being unique or explicitly write out your parameter names using the argNames parameter:

@Pointcut(value="@annotation(profile)",argNames="profile")
protected void logAnnotatedMethods(Profile arg) {    }

Reference:

• @Pointcut javadocs

Answer 2

I was playing around and found that the following worked

@Pointcut("@annotation(profile)")
protected void logAnnotatedMethods(Profile profile) {
}