Acknowledgments

[ Team LiB ]

Acknowledgments I have been working on this book, in one form or another, for more than four years, and many people have helped and supported me along the way. I thank those people who have read manuscripts and commented. This book would simply not have been possible without that feedback. A few have given their reviews especially generous attention. The Silicon Valley Patterns Group, led by Russ Rufer and Tracy Bialek, spent seven weeks scrutinizing the first complete draft of the book. The University of Illinois reading group led by Ralph Johnson also spent several weeks reviewing a later draft. Listening to the long, lively discussions of these groups had a profound effect. Kyle Brown and Martin Fowler contributed detailed feedback, valuable insights, and invaluable moral support (while sitting on a fish). Ward Cunningham's comments helped me shore up some important weak points. Alistair Cockburn encouraged me early on and helped me find my way through the publication process, as did Hilary Evans. David Siegel and Eugene Wallingford have helped me avoid embarrassing myself in the more technical parts. Vibhu Mohindra and Vladimir Gitlevich painstakingly checked all the code examples. Rob Mee read some of my earliest explorations of the material, and brainstormed ideas with me when I was groping for some way to communicate this style of design. He then pored over a much later draft with me. Josh Kerievsky is responsible for one of the major turning points in the book's development: He persuaded me to try out the "Alexandrian" pattern format, which became so central to the book's organization. He also helped me to bring together some of the material now in Part II into a coherent form for the first time, during the intensive "shepherding" process preceding the PLoP conference in 1999. This became a seed around which much of the rest of the book formed. Also I thank Awad Faddoul for the hundreds of hours I sat writing in his wonderful café. That retreat, along with a lot of windsurfing, helped me keep going. And I'm very grateful to Martine Jousset, Richard Paselk, and Ross Venables for creating some beautiful photographs to illustrate a few key concepts (see photo credits on page 517). Before I could have conceived of this book, I had to form my view and understanding of software development. That formation owed a lot to the generosity of a few brilliant people who acted as informal mentors to me, as well as friends. David Siegel, Eric Gold, and Iseult White, each in a different way, helped me develop my way of thinking about software design. Meanwhile, Bruce Gordon, Richard Frey-berg, and Judith Segal, also in very different ways, helped me find my way in the world of successful project work. My own notions naturally grew out of a body of ideas in the air at that time. Some of those contributions will be clear in the main text and referenced where possible. Others are so fundamental that I don't even realize their influence on me. My master's thesis advisor, Dr. Bala Subramanium, turned me on to mathematical modeling, which we applied to chemical reaction kinetics. Modeling is modeling, and that work was part of the path that led to this book. Even before that, my way of thinking was shaped by my parents, Carol and Gary Evans. And a few special teachers awakened my interest or helped me lay foundations, especially Dale Currier (a high school math teacher), Mary Brown (a high school English composition teacher), and Josephine McGlamery (a sixth-grade science teacher). Finally, I thank my friends and family, and Fernando De Leon, for their encouragement all along the way.

[ Team LiB ]