Comments on: I Hate Patterns

By: fb

fb — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 23:57:05 +0000

Some 8 or 9 years ago I was assigned to write some email handling software for volumes not exceeding a dozen mails a day. One -requirement- from the higher-ups was to implement my module as an EJB, for probably no reason besides a pattern abuser said to. (Certainly not for any of the touted benefits of EJBs, which applied in this case not all.) What a miserable job. The whole workplace was heavily buzzword compliant with no shortage of gratuitous XML.

It delighted me years later to learn that they scrapped their whole Java system and rebuilt it from the ground up.

By: owen

owen — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 19:21:42 +0000

I hate XML too and the problem with patterns is that they try to do too much. In fact they try to do everything. And it is at that point when the holes begin to show up. “Right tool for the job” doesn’t even apply to patterns because the patterns are usually the ones playing “king of the hill”.

By: Tim Bray on Design Patterns, Threads, and COM - Standard Deviations

Tim Bray on Design Patterns, Threads, and COM - Standard Deviations — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 06:55:29 +0000

[...] may have read my own two cents on design patterns (hate them) and threads (not a huge [...]

By: Russ Olsen

Russ Olsen — Thu, 02 Mar 2006 03:31:25 +0000

I’m sorry to say that while I think design patterns can be a great tool, I’ve seen all too much abuse along these lines. I once inherited a GUI where every menu item was wired to a command which did nothing but grab a factory and create an accessor which did nothing but grab a factory and create a… Well you get the picture. People who write this stuff just seem to miss that the size of the infrastructure needs to be in proportion to the size of the actual work being done. If the infrastructure is four times the size of the code that actually does something, then you can rewrite the real code 4 times for the price of the infrastructure. Kind of puts the ’savings’ from all the infrastructure in perspective. There is no substitute for real engineering.

Good article.

By: hilquias

hilquias — Wed, 01 Mar 2006 18:40:30 +0000

every developer know this. sorry im stoned

By: Parand Darugar

Parand Darugar — Wed, 01 Mar 2006 18:15:36 +0000

Glen, good point, but let me go on record as saying I also hate hammers and XML

Here’s why I don’t like patterns: based on my observation, they have on the whole had a more negative effect than a positive one on the masses of programmers. Putting aside the theoretical benefits or problems, in practical terms, they’ve been a negative, at least from what I’ve observed.

By: Glen Cooper

Glen Cooper — Wed, 01 Mar 2006 18:05:55 +0000

This is like saying I hate XML because so many people throw around the term as if it’s the solution to everything and should be natively embedded in every solution. Or I hate Ajax because people think it should be used everywhere. Or I hate hammers because I’ve seen a lot of people use the wrong hammer for the job.

The point is Design Patters – just like XML, Ajax or Hammers – are just tools to help us do our job. Of course if you apply the wrong tool to the job you are going to fail miserably. A sledgehammer is not the right tool for hanging a picture. But used in the right way Patterns are a powerful language to help communicate common models, concepts, and approaches to developers.

I believe this is the point your article ended with, but to lead off with an inflammatory statement like “I Hate Patterns” is just as silly as saying “I Hate XML” or “I Hate Hammers”. If you hate patterns for what they are – fine. If you hate them for how they are misused – that’s something else.

By: Mark W. Shead

Mark W. Shead — Sun, 24 Jul 2005 13:59:33 +0000

Dangers of Design Patterns

Here is an interesting discussion about the dangers of design patterns. Design patterns can be a great way to solve problems, but many times they become an excuse to over-architect solutions. Design patterns should reduce complexity. If they introdu…

By: Software As She’s Developed » Blog Archive » Pattern Abuse

Software As She’s Developed » Blog Archive » Pattern Abuse — Tue, 19 Jul 2005 03:46:30 +0000

[...] « Ajax Gems Pattern Abuse Tony Darugar hates patterns: Iâ€™ve seen more horrendous programming sins committed in the [...]

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 18 Jul 2005 17:00:00 +0000

Hear, hear.