Naturally, our survey had to keep ending up in a tie until late today when we finally got a tie-breaker. For some reason, readers wanted some patterns that we had already virtually saturated (like the Flyweight that had four posts) or at least multiple posts. Most, though, seemed satisfied with letting others decide. A couple of things came to be very clear among those who voted. First of all, the great majority of respondents are Flex users. In the last survey we had, a little over half were Flash and the rest were Flex. I know a lot of you had asked for Flash Builder (Flex) based examples, but we’re going to try and stick to just code as much as possible so that both Flex and Flash users can see what’s going on. Maybe we might include a little “starter” file for both Flex and Flash developers.
The other finding is that readers found value in the saturation series. (Either that or those who didn’t like it didn’t bother to participate in the survey!) Anyway, we thank those who participated. Individuals from the following countries participated in the survey (in no particular order):
- South Africa
- Iran
- Morocco
- China
- India
- Brazil
- United States
- Canada
- Netherlands
- Latvia
- Spain
- Columbia
- Slovenia
- Belgium
- Romania
- Ukraine
- France
- Taiwan
Ok, so who won? After all was said and done the Abstract Factory (the one I said gave me the heebie-jeebies) was selected as the Creational pattern and the Bridge for the Structural. Other favorites included, Flyweight, Composite and Builder. Here’s the breakdown:
Creational
Abstract Factory: 40.0%
Builder: 28.0%
Factory: 12.0%
Prototype: 20.0%
Structural
Bridge: 25.9%
Composite: 22.2%
Decorator: 11.1%
Facade: 3.7%
Flyweight: 22.2%
Proxy: 14.8%
IDE Used
Flash Builder (Flex): 62.1%
Flash Professional: 27.6%
Both: 10.3%
Usefulness of Saturated Strategy
Useful: 59.1%
Not Useful: 4.5%
Parts Read Useful: 36.4%
Parts Read Not Useful: 0.0%
Your Voice in a few Clicks!
As promised, we have a survey ready for everyone who would like to provide feedback on the Saturation series. It only takes 5 clicks, and if you didn’t feel like writing a comment, you can do this one in only 5 clicks of your mouse. By clicking 4 radio buttons and 1 submit button, you voice will be heard loud and clear or quietly and muted—whatever your preference. And remember, if you want to provide more details of your preferences, feel free to add a comment either here or in Saturation Feedback: Part I. Click the survey belly button and see what may become an ActionScript 3.0-PHP Project:
We have a tie with both Creational and Structural Design Patterns! Do the 5-click survey and break the ties! (Easy!)
Choose the next Saturated Design Pattern:
- Creational: Abstract Factory, Builder, Factory Method, Prototype
- Structural: Adapter, Bridge, Composite, Decorator, Facade, Flyweight, Proxy
Waiting For Feeback
Every now and again we like to survey our readers about one thing or another. This is the first part: an open-ended invitation for comments about the first installment on the Saturation series. The second part will be a short structured survey requiring nothing more than a few clicks. A while back I thought that a saturation plan would be a good idea—take a representative design pattern and look at it in minute detail. The first one was a
Behavioral type design pattern, the
Strategy pattern. I selected it because it is one of three patterns that is dependent on
delegation (extreme composition). Now that it’s been saturated, what do you think? Good idea? Bad idea? Don’t give a rat’s …? I’d like to hear some unrestrained feedback in the comments section.
What’s Next?
Well, as far as the Saturation Series is concerned, I’ll be working on one from either the Creational or Structural categories. If you have any preferences, just shoot us a comment. Here are the choices:
Creational
- Abstract Factory
- Builder
- Factory Method
- Prototype
Singleton
Structural
- Adapter
- Bridge
- Composite
- Decorator
- Facade
- Flyweight
- Proxy
These patterns are from Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software by Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson, and John Vlissides (AKA The Gang of Four [GoF]) We covered all of these patterns either here on our blog or in our book. Don’t forget to say why you’d like a certain pattern saturated. We always read all of our comments (except for spam and sales pitches.) Usually, we reply to every comment, but in this case we’re going to focus just on listening to what you want.
What are you waiting for? Get commenting!
Bill Sanders
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