A key, over-riding principle behind much of this work is the understanding between common practice and best practice. While not always explicitly stated, this is what drove activities like the inclusion of the anti-patterns (or "worst practices") for each pattern. There are many, many design patterns that do not work, or do not work as well as alternatives.

This is a key reason so much effort went into researching the patterns. We didn't just include something because it was heavily used, or is a much-lauded feature of a new and well-covered device. If it's common or well-known, but bad, we include it, but with warnings.

This also means, again, that there was some serious discussion of what qualifies as a pattern. In general, a pattern must be best practice, and common enough to be recognized or encountered.

There may therefore be some odd cases where an antipattern has general solutions listed, but no specific solutions in the body of the pattern. Though the problem is known, but no single solution has emerged.

Best practice that is not implemented anywhere (or only very rarely) is not described, as it does not rise to the level of a pattern. Only real world items are patterns by our thinking, not clever concepts, demonstrations or videos of how the future might work. These are, however, sometimes mentioned as future technologies or options to look forward to.

Next: Reading the Patterns

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