Thinking in Patterns with Java

Downloading the book

The book is available as HTML pages with an index and frames for easy navigation. This download contains the source code for the book, and instructions for building the code.

Download Thinking in Patterns here

Building the code for this book

The detailed instructions for building the code for this book are included with the download of the book.

Genesis of this book

The more that I worked towards the deadline for Thinking in Java, 2nd edition, the more I started to feel that either the schedule or the quality would be compromised. However, when I broke the "Polymorphism" chapter into two chapters based on my experience giving the seminar (the single chapter produced a lecture that was too long by far), it reminded me of the roots of that book, which was the Hands-On Java seminar. The biggest bottleneck in the book was the one chapter that is not part of the seminar, which was the last one ("Design Patterns"). In addition to being in very rough form and promising a tremendous amount of work — and research, which always takes more time than I think it will — to get in shape, this chapter kept getting bigger and really deserves its own book. So that's what I have done — pulled the Design Patterns chapter out so that it can be turned into a separate book. Because it's on the Web, this is not really taking anything away from the reader, and it means that the schedule becomes far more practical. I will be posting information here and in the newsletter as this project develops.

Please don't ask when it will be done. I've been working on understanding the patterns material since before the Gang of Four Design Patterns book came out and I first heard the term and understood that's what I was struggling with. The seminar has also gone through a lot of evolution. And I just finished doing two books back to back, and feeling rushed and that I wasn't doing the kind of job that I've become accustomed to. On the other hand, the interest in this seminar and this material seems to be very high, and every time we give the seminar I get new and better ideas, so I believe that this project will get a high priority. In the end, though, I want to make it right before even thinking about putting it in print.