The Java EE 6 Tutorial, Volume I

Using Annotations

Annotations enable a declarative style of programming, and so encompass both the declarative and programmatic security concepts. Users can specify information about security within a class file using annotations. When the application is deployed, this information is used by the Enterprise Server. Not all security information can be specified using annotations, however. Some information must be specified in the application deployment descriptors.

Annotations let you avoid writing boilerplate code under many circumstances by enabling tools to generate it from annotations in the source code. This leads to a declarative programming style, where the programmer says what should be done and tools emit the code to do it. It also eliminates the need for maintaining side files that must be kept up to date with changes in source files. Instead the information can be maintained in the source file.

In this tutorial, specific annotations that can be used to specify security information within a class file are described in Securing an Enterprise Bean Using Declarative Security and Annotations. In this version of the tutorial, annotations are not shown for securing web applications. This is because the use of annotations vary between web components, and deployment descriptors are the common method of securing web applications.

The following are sources for more information on annotations:

Links to this information are provided in Further Information about Security.