WRT: https://jira.jboss.org/jira/browse/JBAS-5535 I never really followed up on this, but the reason why this issue has stalled is because AOP is introducing a ciruclar dependency in the bootstrap. AspectManager -> scoping policy -> deployment unit -> main deployer -> jmx -> aop (via @JMX) This means we can't properly setup the bootstrap classloaders to be modular, see the FIXMEs in conf/classloader.xml | <classloader name="bootstrap-classloader" xmlns="urn:jboss:classloader:1.0" export-all="NON_EMPTY" import-all="true"> | <!-- FIXME Move to Deployers --> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-core-spi.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-core.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-client-spi.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-client.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-structure-spi.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-spi.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-impl.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-vfs-spi.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-deployers-vfs.jar</root> | <!-- System --> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-system.jar</root> | <!-- FIXME Move to JMX --> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-j2se.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-mbeans.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-jmx.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jboss-system-jmx.jar</root> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/dom4j.jar</root> | <!-- JAXB impl here, api is in endorsed --> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/jaxb-impl.jar</root> | <!-- STAX2 impl here, api is in endorsed --> | <root>${jboss.lib.url}/wstx.jar</root> | </classloader> | The fix would to refactor the VFSClassLoaderScopingPolicy such that the deployment logic is in the deployers which just invoke the registerClassLoader() i.e. remove its dependency on the deployment layer That way we can bootstrap the AspectManager before the deployers and JMX are even loaded and it becomes independent of this implementation detail. View the original post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4176518#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...