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Aspect-oriented programming (AOP) is an exciting new development in the field of software engineering. The open-source AspectJ project has taken a leading role in defining what an aspect-oriented programming language should look like and in building tools that enable aspect-oriented techniques to be employed in the development of large-scale commercial software. IBM both contributes to the development of AspectJ and uses it internally with its accompanying IDE (integrated development environment) support, AspectJ Development Tools (AJDT). This paper provides an introduction to aspect-oriented programming using AspectJ and AJDT. We also discuss the role that open source (and being an open-source project) has played in the ongoing development of AspectJ, and how this has facilitated a level of collaboration and exploitation that would not have been possible otherwise. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]