Can AOP Support Extensibility in Client-Server Architectures?

Extensible client-server software requires a clear sepa- ration of core services from those that are customizable. This separation is difficult, as these customizable features tend to crosscut the primary functionality of the core ser- vices. We believe that an aspect-oriented approach to client-server architectures supports extensibility in a way that is more flexible than traditional approaches. Our ex- periment focuses on clients within a distributed file sys- tem that dynamically negotiate with servers for adaptive delayed-write and prefetching behaviour.