Where next?
I hope I have successfully whetted your appetite with these questions or, at the very least, helped you decide whether this book is for you. Either way, I have outlined the premise to be explored in these pages. My research is incomplete, and I wonder if it will ever end, as this topic is significantly broader than I initially believed. I continue to dig further as I write this first edition and will likely produce a follow-up edition a decade or so from now. If not, I hope this book will explain why I, like the GoF, never got around to it.
What I have learnt has changed my mind multiple times. I used to be a staunch design pattern sceptic. I believed patterns to be useless cargo-cult content. However, I now find them fascinating and useful but ultimately unfinished. There is much work to be done to get them to where they could be, so I lay out the measures that need to be taken. This is not a call to arms but rather a projection of what the future may hold if I, or others, engage in the necessary work. There is promise there, but no promises, I’m afraid.
Now, we must start at the beginning. A full description of the origin of the form is absent from so much of the literature on design patterns. However, as is so often the case, history holds the key to understanding. It will help unlock their potential and reveal the reasons why things went wrong for design patterns in the way they did.