U S WEST Advanced Technologies
Patterns Information Page

Patterns are about what works. Patterns give us a way to talk about what works. … [After creating the patterns] we can then use these artifacts off the shelf, and focus our design energy on ever loftier architectural concerns.
Brian Foote in Pattern Languages of Program Design 3

Human communication is the bottleneck in software development. … Patterns capture established practices that remain obscure in the broad practice of a given domain.
James Coplien (of Bell Labs) in Software Patterns

Patterns express the understanding gained from practice in software design and construction. Writing them is a good way to deepen, structure, and pass on the system skills we build up and call ‘expertise’ or even ‘intuition’.
Frank Buschmann (of Siemens)

What is so exciting about patterns? It is probably the fact that they constitute a ‘grass roots’ effort to build on the collective experience of skilled designers and software engineers. Such experts already have solutions to many recurring design problems. Patterns capture these proven solutions in an easily-available and, hopefully, well-written form.
Buschmann et al. in Pattern-oriented Software Architecture: A System of Patterns

We have not attempted to measure the impact of patterns on productivity but we have noticed that communication between people with a ‘shared space’ of patterns is quicker, more complete, and less likely to be misunderstood. At the programming level, we have had people design what might be rather complex designs much more quickly than expected by using one or more design patterns.
Gerard Meszaros (of BNR, the research and development subsidiary of NorTel)