Did you find a work around?
I get the exact same exception with Spring 3.0.0.M3 and java-config 1.0.0.M4 while it works just fine if I switch to Spring 2.5.6.
It indeed appears to be a version problem as the default Autowire value defined in the @Configuration interface (Autowire.INHERITED) doesn't exist in Spring-beans 3.0.0.M3 org.springframework.beans.factory.annotation.Autow ire (this enum only has 3 values : NO, BY_TYPE and BY_NAME) 
For the records here are the relevant parts of my application
My configuration class
Code:
import org.springframework.beans.factory.annotation.Autowire;
import org.springframework.config.java.annotation.Configuration;
import org.springframework.config.java.annotation.Lazy;
import org.springframework.config.java.annotation.valuesource.PropertiesValueSource;
import org.springframework.config.java.plugin.aop.AspectJAutoProxy;
import org.springframework.config.java.plugin.context.AnnotationDrivenConfig;
import org.springframework.config.java.plugin.tx.AnnotationDrivenTx;
import org.springframework.config.java.support.ConfigurationSupport;
@Configuration(defaultLazy = Lazy.FALSE, defaultAutowire = Autowire.BY_TYPE, checkRequired = true)
@AspectJAutoProxy
@AnnotationDrivenTx
@AnnotationDrivenConfig
@PropertiesValueSource(locations = { "classpath:database.properties" })
public class DatabaseConfig extends ConfigurationSupport
{
...
My unit test
Code:
import org.junit.runner.RunWith;
import org.springframework.config.java.test.JavaConfigContextLoader;
import org.springframework.test.context.ContextConfiguration;
import org.springframework.test.context.junit4.SpringJUnit4ClassRunner;
@RunWith(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.class)
@ContextConfiguration(locations=
{
"com.app.DatabaseConfig"
},
loader=JavaConfigContextLoader.class)
public class JavaConfigTest
{
my pom
Code:
<properties>
<spring.version>3.0.0.M3</spring.version>
<spring-security.version>3.0.0.M1</spring-security.version>
<junit.version>4.5</junit.version>
</properties>
...
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-web</artifactId>
<version>${spring.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-tx</artifactId>
<version>${spring.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-aop</artifactId>
<version>${spring.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-orm</artifactId>
<version>${spring.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-jdbc</artifactId>
<version>${spring.version}</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.integration</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-integration-mail</artifactId>
<version>1.0.2.SR1</version>
</dependency>
<dependency>
<groupId>org.springframework.javaconfig</groupId>
<artifactId>spring-javaconfig</artifactId>
<version>1.0.0.M4</version>
</dependency>
Exception while loading JavaConfigApplicationContext
