[wnesensohn]

I'm glad I stumbled upon his books when researching design patterns early on in my career. His writing in 'The Timeless Way of Building' left a big impression on me, precisely because it didn't reduce building to a sequence of mechanical steps which are to be followed exactly, but allowed, even called for, gaining a deeper understanding for quality. It's hard to express, but he did a stellar job at it.

It's somewhat ironic that he is said to have laid the foundations of the design patterns movement which, I don't know when, must have taken a series of wrong turns to end up where it did.

Thank you Mr. Alexander for writing about these fuzzy things which dare to be named.

[toyg]

> the design patterns movement which, I don't know when, must have taken a series of wrong turns

Such is always the case, as soon as anything becomes a "school of thought". From Christianity to patterns and agile, someone will evangelise a set of concepts that s/he strongly believes in, and they will be reinterpreted or exploited by others for their own purposes. For design patterns, it was the whole "Enterprise Java" sector who went overboard and became doctrinaire.