Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture (Addison-Wesley Signature Series (Fowler)) Hardcover – 22 Nov. 2002

Martinn Fowler describes in turn many of the common software architectural patterns using a combination of high-level description, code samples (mostly in Java) and suggestions about when to use and when not to use each pattern. The text of the book is consistent and logical in its presentation with plenty of cross-referencing between the patterns. The book is developer-oriented and focuses on principals more than the detailed implementations.As the author states, this is not a software cookbook, The book helps the developer to approach architectural problems with a range of concepts and strategies to solve design problems. It describes the architectural frameworks that can be used to implement systems of different sizes. It is a useful reference book too. I expect I will be referring to it a lot when I am looking for ideas.Only downside was the occasional grammatical error which meant I had to re-read parts of it to understand the text properly. Only a minor issue but surprising in a book of this quality.

I consider this one as a basic reference on my bookshelf. While I found GoF very useful as one of this books that make you think and show you the way to your programmer's career when you are not very experienced, Fowler's book adds the enterprise touch in a way I enjoy each time I get back to the book.I tells you about those many things in real life applications that you may have not come across yet and you need to develop carefully when you are working in a big project.The enterprise approach to patterns is light but described in a rigorous manner.I must confess I enjoy these books that are not tied to a given version of a given language much more than the rest.The information you get is more open and you get a better understanding of the big picture.If this one doesn't become a timeless reference (the way our profession changes I wouldn't dare to say so from any book), it will sure stand as a classic of its era.

If you are involved in designing robust, maintainable and highly flexible systems then you have to know these patterns. Other books may go further with patterns now (SOA Patterns for example) but this is the first book every aspiring IT designer should read. It's about clarity and a common understanding in what is still an incredibly young industry. If you want a stimulating and rewarding career in IT and to understand what IT architects are talking about half the time then read and digest this book for a start! Highly recommended.

With the increasing usage of higher level languages, the importance of design patterns is also increasing and this book is an excellent compendium of the patterns that you need the most.While there are a lot of patterns here that can be found among those proposed by the Gang of Four or found at Sun's BluePrints website, the explanations of the significance of the pattern and when and where it should be used makes it invaluable to programmers. The patterns covered are almost perfect in that they cover the most commonly used patterns as well as the patterns that can make the biggest difference. It's not perfect though as there are a couple of patterns that you feel were included to make up the numbers ('Money' being the most obvious offender).Incidentally, it's also a great source for disambiguation of terms too where disparate teams can use terms from this book as a common reference. Very useful when dealing with remote teams.

Firstly, from comments about the paperweight of the pages, I was expecting to receive something that resembles the pages of a missal, which are very thin. Worry not!I am a non-developer and have found this an easy read, and dare I say compelling! I don't understand all of it, but it has certainly enhanced my understanding to be better able to comprehend the architecture behind the code I am reviewing.

Excellent book showing a good range of approaches and providing practical advice.

I try to keep it close by, and reference it as much as it makes sense. Really a must have for any serious developer, even if most of the patterns are obsolete these days, it's still useful to know how things work, or how most frameworks are built underneath. Although the languages used are Java, C++ and C# in the book, all the principles apply. It's only up to the reader to know how mature a language is to determine if there is something already available in the framework that they're using or if they need to implement something on their own.

I'm a .NET developer and, since the book advertises the fact that it covers .NET as well as J2EE I had high hopes. By and large it lived up to them but in some places I think it let itself down.In particular the majority of the code is in Java. I don't mind mentally mapping from Java to C#, however its the differences between the framework libraries that creates the problem as I simply cannot do that mapping.Despite this the book is OK, if you concentrate on the patterns themselves then your fine but I think Java developers will get far more from it as they're going to learn not just the patterns but details you need to be aware of when applying them.