AOP use case? (was Re: Proposed PEP: Treating Builtins as Constants in the Standard)

[Peter Hansen]

Daniel 'Dang' Griffith wrote:

> On Mon, 19 Apr 2004 08:09:56 -0400, Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com>
> wrote:
> 
> [snip]
> ...
> 
>>automated testing.  The most easily demonstrated one is where
>>the builtin open/file calls are replaced with a simulated ("mock")
>>file system which applies to *all* modules, not just a single
>>module under test.  This functionality is critical to some people
>>using Python with the Test-Driven Development approach to software.
> 
> 
> Isn't this the use case for AOP you were looking for?
>     --dang

As you might imagine from my previous postings, I have no idea.
I don't understand well enough what AOP really is to say,
obviously (given my requests for compelling use cases so I can
understand why I would even want to investigate it).

Can you describe how AOP would solve this problem?  As I
understand it so far, it has nothing to do with mock objects...

-Peter