Pattern Languages
A Pattern Language provides a process for analysing recurrent problems and a mechanism for capturing those problems and archetypal solutions.
The value of a Pattern Language is that it remains readable and engaging whilst providing basic hooks for further machine processing.
Subject matter experts of any domain will recognise similar problems occurring time and again as well as certain ‘winning solutions’ that seem to address these problems time and again. Frustration often arises when these experts recognise that others are facing similar problems but that they (the domain experts) have no satisfactory means by which to communicate their solutions to those others. The experts would like to share but lack a clear form and method by which to do it.
Nowhere is this more noticeable than in the consultancy business working with multi-disciplinary domains or in large-scale organisations that need everyone from senior management to junior developers and front-line staff to share a common strategy and vision. Nowhere is this more acute than in such organisations that are undergoing profound change or transformation.
Although there may be an implicit or explicit organisational change strategy, this will be expressed and realised in many different ways, from top-level Board, Ministerial or Departmental policy statements, all the way through to specific technology infrastructure and service changes.
Pattern Languages provide a means to bridge that communications gap and should help to address issues such as wasted effort from duplicating the same solution from the same type of problem; the lack of a common terminology and definitions of key terms; the inability to extrapolate from specific problems to generic ones; and addressing the broader concern of capturing complex problems with greater insight to the ‘black box’ that often exists between broadly stated initial needs and the delivered solution.
A Pattern Language is not an ‘out-of-the-box’ solution but rather some ‘familiar’ patterns with which a team can work. The Pattern Language provides the basic vocabulary, grammar, structure and plot – but each project has to write its own story.
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