GOF Patterns Applied

Design Patterns are proven and powerful techniques that can help improve the resiliency, maintainability, and extensibility of your applications. However, overusing or misapplying patterns is a common mistake often times resulting in applications that are over-architected, and resemble a tangled web of classes. How can patterns be applied to achieve the goal of better software?

This session offers a gentle introduction to design patterns by examining a small, yet very usable framework designed using 7 common GOF patterns. We?ll examine the framework, and explore how each pattern is used as well as how each pattern emerged based on real, instead of perceived need. Less flexible alternatives to the chosen patterns will also be discussed. To conclude, we?ll examine how the patterns are applied in conjunction with each other, forming more complex compound patterns. Each pattern will be presented with accompanying source code, and all examples are gleaned from real world scenarios.

About Kirk Knoernschild

Kirk is an industry analyst at Burton Group. For 15 years, he has worked in the trenches on real software projects. He takes a keen interest in design, architecture, application development platforms, agile development, and the IT industry in general, especially as it relates to software development.

In 2002, Kirk wrote the book Java Design: Objects, UML, and Process, published by Addison-Wesley. He has also written numerous whitepapers and articles, including The Agile Developer column for The Agile Journal. Kirk is the founder of Extensible Java, a growing resource of component design pattern heuristics for Java that can easily be applied to most other platforms, including .Net. Kirk has trained thousands of software professionals, teaching courses on UML, Java J2EE technology, object-oriented development, component based development, software architecture, and software process. He enjoys hacking in a variety of languages, including Java, .Net, Ruby, and PHP.

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