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REC: Because the covering annotation itself would always be included in the result and it is almost never needed. So handling it specifically (since we already know it) is easier than tediously filtering it out from the result in 99.9% of the cases. 

MS: Good point.  Just for completeness, I'll point out a somewhat surprising fact that the covering annotation is not always included; it is only returned if

• it is in the index 
• it's type is the index's type or subtype.
• You can make annotations that don't fit these criteria, and use them as "covering" spec.

selectCovered(Class<T>, AnnotationFS)

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