How to read Javadoc comments by reflection?

Question

I need to know how to read Javadoc comments at run-time (probably by reflection?)

Say I have the following function:

/** *  function that do some thing */ public void myFunc() {      //... } 

At runtime, I can get much information about this function by reflection.. But cannot read the comments. So the question is, How to read this javadoc comments at runtime.

Answer 1

Doclet class:

public class ExtractCommentsDoclet {     public static boolean start(RootDoc root) throws IOException {         for (ClassDoc c : root.classes()) {             print(c.qualifiedName(), c.commentText());             for (FieldDoc f : c.fields(false)) {                 print(f.qualifiedName(), f.commentText());             }             for (MethodDoc m : c.methods(false)) {                 print(m.qualifiedName(), m.commentText());                 if (m.commentText() != null && m.commentText().length() > 0) {                     for (ParamTag p : m.paramTags())                         print(m.qualifiedName() + "@" + p.parameterName(), p.parameterComment());                     for (Tag t : m.tags("return")) {                         if (t.text() != null && t.text().length() > 0)                             print(m.qualifiedName() + "@return", t.text());                     }                 }             }         }         return true;     }      private static void print(String name, String comment) throws IOException {         if (comment != null && comment.length() > 0) {             new FileWriter(name + ".txt").append(comment).close();         }     } } 

And maven execution:

<plugin>     <artifactId>maven-javadoc-plugin</artifactId>     <extensions>true</extensions>     <executions>         <execution>             <phase>compile</phase>             <goals>                 <goal>aggregate</goal>             </goals>         </execution>     </executions>     <configuration>         <doclet>ExtractCommentsDoclet</doclet>         <docletPath>${project.build.directory}/classes</docletPath>         <reportOutputDirectory>${project.build.outputDirectory}/META-INF</reportOutputDirectory>         <useStandardDocletOptions>false</useStandardDocletOptions>     </configuration> </plugin> 

Read docs from classpath:META-INF/apidocs