[jt2190]

According to Martin Fowler [1], Inversion of Control is an alternative to using a Service Locator:

  > In the Java community there's been a rush of lightweight
  > containers that help to assemble components from
  > different projects into a cohesive application.
  > Underlying these containers is a common pattern to how
  > they perform the wiring, a concept they refer under the
  > very generic name of "Inversion of Control". In this
  > article I dig into how this pattern works... and
  > contrast it with the Service Locator alternative. The
  > choice between them is less important than the principle
  > of separating configuration from use.

[1] http://martinfowler.com/articles/injection.html

(edit: Also, the Spring Framework has had alternatives to XML configuration for years: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/webservices/library/ws-spr...)