There is a growing need to have a way of extending javac functionality with "checkers" that can analyze a Java program.

Annotation processers are great but have a number of limitations inherent in the specification. In particular, anno processors are run at a specific point in the compilation pipeline, before syntax trees have been fully attributed, and the "round" processing model requires that each compilation unit may be processed multiple times.

It would help to have a way of running light-weight plug-ins in a more flexible manner.