Design Patterns in Information System Development

Having been involved in the development of over two hundred small computer systems that could be classified as ‘transaction processing systems’ the author noted that, among an amazingly wide variety of applications, a relatively small number of design elements recur. These standard solutions to commonly occurring problems encountered in the development of transaction processing systems may be thought of as patterns for system design, somewhat analogous to software patterns as described by Gamma et al [5]. In this paper, six design patterns found commonly in transaction processing systems are identified. The four simplest of them are described briefly and the other two are fully specified making use of the framework proposed by Appleton [1] for the specification of software patterns. A sample of 18 projects is examined and the design patterns present in each are identified. The importance and usefulness of the recognition of this particular class of design patterns in the development of transaction processing systems is argued.