Resolved SPR-6618. Restrictions were too tight on overloaded bean methods and were preventing it altogether. Overloading is now allowed, as long as there is no ambiguity at runtime which bean method should be invoked.

org.springframework.core/src/main/java/org/springframework/core/type/MethodMetadata.java

@@ -24,6 +24,7 @@ import java.util.Map;
  *
  * @author Juergen Hoeller
  * @author Mark Pollack
+ * @author Chris Beams
  * @since 3.0
  * @see StandardMethodMetadata
  * @see AnnotationMetadata#getAnnotatedMethods
@@ -35,6 +36,11 @@ public interface MethodMetadata {
 	 */
 	String getMethodName();
 
+	/**
+	 * Return the fully-qualified name of the class that declares this method.
+	 */
+	public String getDeclaringClassName();
+
 	/**
 	 * Return whether the underlying method is declared as 'static'.
 	 */

org.springframework.core/src/main/java/org/springframework/core/type/StandardMethodMetadata.java

@@ -30,6 +30,7 @@ import org.springframework.util.Assert;
  *
  * @author Juergen Hoeller
  * @author Mark Pollack
+ * @author Chris Beams
  * @since 3.0
  */
 public class StandardMethodMetadata implements MethodMetadata {
@@ -53,10 +54,14 @@ public class StandardMethodMetadata implements MethodMetadata {
 		return this.introspectedMethod;
 	}
 
-
+	
 	public String getMethodName() {
 		return this.introspectedMethod.getName();
 	}
+	
+	public String getDeclaringClassName() {
+		return this.introspectedMethod.getDeclaringClass().getName();
+	}
 
 	public boolean isStatic() {
 		return Modifier.isStatic(this.introspectedMethod.getModifiers());

org.springframework.core/src/main/java/org/springframework/core/type/classreading/AnnotationMetadataReadingVisitor.java

@@ -57,7 +57,7 @@ final class AnnotationMetadataReadingVisitor extends ClassMetadataReadingVisitor
 
 	@Override
 	public MethodVisitor visitMethod(int access, String name, String desc, String signature, String[] exceptions) {
-		MethodMetadataReadingVisitor mm = new MethodMetadataReadingVisitor(name, access, this.classLoader);
+		MethodMetadataReadingVisitor mm = new MethodMetadataReadingVisitor(name, access, this.getClassName(), this.classLoader);
 		this.methodMetadataSet.add(mm);
 		return mm;
 	}

org.springframework.core/src/main/java/org/springframework/core/type/classreading/MethodMetadataReadingVisitor.java

@@ -41,15 +41,18 @@ final class MethodMetadataReadingVisitor extends MethodAdapter implements Method
 
 	private final int access;
 
+	private String declaringClassName;
+
 	private final ClassLoader classLoader;
 
 	private final Map<String, Map<String, Object>> attributeMap = new LinkedHashMap<String, Map<String, Object>>();
 
 
-	public MethodMetadataReadingVisitor(String name, int access, ClassLoader classLoader) {
+	public MethodMetadataReadingVisitor(String name, int access, String declaringClassName, ClassLoader classLoader) {
 		super(new EmptyVisitor());
 		this.name = name;
 		this.access = access;
+		this.declaringClassName = declaringClassName;
 		this.classLoader = classLoader;
 	}
 
@@ -85,4 +88,8 @@ final class MethodMetadataReadingVisitor extends MethodAdapter implements Method
 		return this.attributeMap.get(annotationType);
 	}
 
+	public String getDeclaringClassName() {
+		return this.declaringClassName;
+	}
+
 }