Richard gabriel patterns software

In Patterns of Software , the respected software pioneer and computer scientist, Richard Gabriel, gives us an informative inside look at the world of software design and computer programming and the business that surrounds them. In this wide-ranging volume, Gabriel discusses such topics as what makes a successful programming language, how the rest of the world looks at and responds to the work of computer scientists, how he first became involved in computer programming and software development, what makes a successful software business, and why his own company, Lucid, failed in , ten years after its inception.

Perhaps the most interesting and enlightening section of the book is Gabriel's detailed look at what he believes are the lessons that can be learned from architect Christopher Alexander, whose books--including the seminal A Pattern Language --have had a profound influence on the computer programming community. Gabriel illuminates some of Alexander's key insights--the quality without a name, pattern languages, habitability, piecemeal growth--and reveals how these influential architectural ideas apply equally well to the construction of a computer program.

Gabriel explains the concept of habitability, for example, by comparing a program to a New England farmhouse and the surrounding structures which slowly grow and are modified according to the needs and desires of the people who live and work on the farm. Programs live and grow, and their inhabitants--the programmers--need to work with that program the way the farmer works with the homestead.

Although computer scientists and software entrepreneurs will get much out of this book, the essays are accessible to everyone and will intrigue anyone curious about Silicon Valley, computer programming, or the world of high technology. Computer Science Programming. More details. Gabriel 7 books 5 followers. Search review text. It reminds me of poker literature. When I studied poker most seriously, it was immature as a field of study, with an oral tradition of knowledge-transmission and enthusiastic practitioners.

This led to a lot of technical and semi-technical writing that is unconstrained by traditional subgenre boundaries. Such projects don't always succeed or endure, but the practical alternative to this kind of artifact is usually not a polished, impeccably structured book but rather nothing at all.

So, in the case of Richard Gabriel, if someone loves software, loves architecture, and wants to write a long meditation on the connections between the ineffable qualities of great software and the career of Christopher Alexander, I really want that person to write that meditation. My life is better because Barry Greenstein wrote something that reminds me of Seneca more than anything else , Bob Ciaffone saw fit to publish occasionally speculative advice back in and because poker literature was unsaturated enough to have some room for my own self-published speculations.

It's also better because I picked up this book. I just can't finish it. Some notes: Gabriel speaks of habitability in software design. Michael Feathers gives an related warning: "Remember, code is your house, and you have to live in it.

It has infiltrated my work: every day I think of myself as living in the software I work on. Gabriel says that clarity "is just too rare, and it's dangerous too, in a funny way. Aristotle famously warns us to tailor the precision of our descriptions to the underlying subject matter: Don't settle for mere persuasion if you're discussing geometry, but also don't expect geometrical proof if you're talking about the weather. We want clarity in software, but only insofar as it's there to be achieved.