Design Patterns == weakness in language

[Derek Parnell]

On Sun, 17 Sep 2006 22:39:42 +0100, Steve Horne wrote:

> On Sat, 16 Sep 2006 09:29:38 +0200, renox <renosky at free.fr> wrote:
> 
>>The claim is that "16 of 23 patterns have qualitatively simpler 
>>implementation in Lisp or Dylan than in C++ for at least some uses of 
>>each pattern" which is a very different that claiming that design 
>>patterns are unnecessary.
> 
> 23 patterns?
> 
> The GOF book has precisely 23 patterns. So presumably, the logic is
> that this set of patterns is definitive and they are the only patterns
> that exist...

I do not believe that it necessarily follows that ..

  "The claim is that '16 of 23 patterns have qualitatively simpler 
   implementation in Lisp or Dylan than in C++ for at least some 
   uses of each pattern' which is a very different that claiming
   that design patterns are unnecessary."

implies ...

  "The GOF book has precisely 23 patterns. So presumably, the logic
   is that this set of patterns is definitive and they are the only
   patterns that exist..."

The required logic links are not present, IMHO. I think your presumption is
just that; a presumption. It is not really based on logic at all.

Firstly renox quoted someone else and that quote mentioned the number 23.
And while it is a safe assumtion that 23 refers to the GOF patterns, there
is not link that then imples that either renox or the person he quotes is
saying that the GOF patterns represent the entire set of patterns in
existence. In fact, the person quoted could have said '70% of the patterns
found in the GOF book' and still made his point.

Finally, the point that renox was making, namely that even though someone
believes that most of the GOF patterns could be implemented simpler in
non-C++ languages, it doesn't follow then that therefore design patterns
are unnecessary - is still a good point.

-- 
Derek Parnell
Melbourne, Australia
"Down with mediocrity!"