Designing in the Future

Becoming a better designer means getting better at what we do now while not getting lulled into accepting the status quo. To stay effective as designers, we need to continue to learn, adapt, keep an open mind, and work to perfect our craft.     

Characterizing classes

Class characterization is a key step of object design. It serves two purposes: to clarify at a glance some important aspects of a class's expected behavior and to communicate its design intent to others. Depending on the type of systems we design and build, we naturally find certain characterizations to be more compelling than others. Recognizing and choosing effective characterizations is an essential skill that all class designers should master. In this column, the author introduces several characteristics to classes when trying to understand their nature and purpose.     

Designing Then and Now

Over the past 25 years, we've made great advances in tooling, technologies, and techniques that make software design more concrete. But design still requires careful thought.     

Up-front Design

There can be significant benefits in thinking through a design until you get it "right enough" before launching into a major development effort. For such up-front design to be effective, you must develop a design rhythm that balances thinking, learning, and doing.     

Does Beautiful Code Imply Beautiful Design?

This article claims brevity can contribute to code beauty-clarity of purpose, expressive use of the programming language, and design elegance also play a part. But is there more to good design than beautiful code? A good design is more than cleanly, clearly, and consistently expressed code. Beautiful code is beautiful only if it preserves and makes evident the designer's intent. What was once a good design often degrades as new functionality is added. It would be great to throw code away and rebuild it anew every few years, but that's not practical. Instead, the code should be made habitable.     

Creating Sustainable Designs

Christopher Alexander's concept of centers and properties of living structures can help developers create pleasing, sustainable software designs.     

Explaining Your Design

Have you ever tried to explain some aspect of your design and not known where to start? Perhaps you had to present how you solved a problem or justify your chosen design among several alternatives, and you weren't sure how to highlight key design aspects critical in achieving a certain requirement. Design decisions with widespread impact or design nuances that might confuse new team members can benefit from good definitions and narrative explanations. When fellow designers repeatedly ask, "why did you do it that way?" It's good to have an effective presentation that explains the tricky parts of your design without losing people in the details