Spring AOP - XML Based After Returning Advice

After is an advice type which ensures that an advice runs after the method execution only if the method completes successfully. Following is the syntax of after advice.

Syntax

<aop:config>
   <aop:aspect id = "log" ref = "logging">
      <aop:PointCut id = "PointCut-id" expression = "execution( expression )"/>    
      <aop:after-returning PointCut-ref = "PointCut-id" 
         returning = "retVal" method = "methodName"/>
   </aop:aspect>
</aop:config>

Where,

• PointCut-id − id of the PointCut.

• methodName − Method name of the function to be called after a called function returns successfully.

To understand the above-mentioned concepts related to After Returning Advice, let us write an example which will implement After Returning advice. To write our example with few advices, let us have a working Eclipse IDE in place and use the following steps to create a Spring application −

Following is the content of Logging.java file. This is actually a sample of aspect module, which defines the methods to be called at various points.

package com.howcodex;

public class Logging {

   /** 
    * This is the method which I would like to execute
    * when any method returns.
    */
   public void afterReturningAdvice(Object retVal){
      System.out.println("Returning:" + retVal.toString() );
   }
}

Following is the content of the Student.java file.

package com.howcodex;

public class Student {
   private Integer age;
   private String name;

   public void setAge(Integer age) {
      this.age = age;
   }
   
   public Integer getAge() {
      System.out.println("Age : " + age );
      System.out.println("Exception raised");
      throw new IllegalArgumentException();
      return age;
   }

   public void setName(String name) {
      this.name = name;
   }
   
   public String getName() {
      System.out.println("Name : " + name );
      return name;
   }
   
   public void printThrowException(){
      System.out.println("Exception raised");
      throw new IllegalArgumentException();
   }
}

Following is the content of the MainApp.java file.

package com.howcodex;

import org.springframework.context.ApplicationContext;
import org.springframework.context.support.ClassPathXmlApplicationContext;

public class MainApp {
   public static void main(String[] args) {
      ApplicationContext context = 
         new ClassPathXmlApplicationContext("Beans.xml");

      Student student = (Student) context.getBean("student");

      student.getName();
      student.getAge();     
   }
}

Following is the configuration file Beans.xml.

<?xml version = "1.0" encoding = "UTF-8"?>
<beans xmlns = "http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans"
   xmlns:xsi = "http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" 
   xmlns:aop = "http://www.springframework.org/schema/aop"
   xsi:schemaLocation = "http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans
   http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans/spring-beans-3.0.xsd 
   http://www.springframework.org/schema/aop 
   http://www.springframework.org/schema/aop/spring-aop-3.0.xsd ">

   <aop:config>
      <aop:aspect id = "log" ref = "logging">
         <aop:PointCut id = "selectAll" 
         expression = "execution(* com.howcodex.*.*(..))"/>
         <aop:after-returning PointCut-ref = "selectAll" 
            method = "afterReturningAdvice" returning = "retVal"/>         
      </aop:aspect>
   </aop:config>

   <!-- Definition for student bean -->
   <bean id = "student" class = "com.howcodex.Student">
      <property name = "name"  value = "Zara" />
      <property name = "age"  value = "11"/>      
   </bean>

   <!-- Definition for logging aspect -->
   <bean id = "logging" class = "com.howcodex.Logging"/> 
      
</beans>

Run Project

Once you are done creating the source and configuration files, run your application. Rightclick on MainApp.java in your application and use run as Java Application command. If everything is fine with your application, it will print the following message.

Name : Zara
Returning : Name
Age : 11
Exception raised