A visual tool for using design patterns as pattern languages

  • Authors:
  • Paloma Díaz;Ignacio Aedo;Mary Beth Rosson;John M. Carroll

  • Affiliations:
  • Universidad Carlos III, Leganés (Madrid). Spain;Universidad Carlos III, Leganés (Madrid). Spain;Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA;Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the International Conference on Advanced Visual Interfaces
  • Year:
  • 2010

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Abstract

Design patterns document successful solutions to recurrent problems in a specific software development domain. However, finding the patterns you need can be difficult, often requiring the designer to comprehend a long narrative description to understand the benefits, implications and trade-offs of each pattern and of its relationships with others. In this paper we propose a visual notation supported by a software tool that may help to identify patterns that could satisfy a designer's goals, as well as conveying the positive and negative relations among patterns, including dependencies and collisions among patterns selected for a specific problem. This work extends the concept of Softgoal Interdependency Graphs (SIG) enhancing them with a number of visual clues and interaction capabilities to help designers realize the contributions and trade-offs of their design ideas and the complexity of the solution space they are building up.