Developing adaptable software architectures using design patterns: an NFR approach

Just about everything changes, and so should a software system accordingly in order to survive and succeed. But how can we develop such a software system? Lately, a growing number of practitioners have shown great interests in using design patterns towards the development of an adaptable system, since design patterns represent high-level abstractions that reflect the experience of no other than skilled practitioners themselves. According to a given format, design patterns describe the context, problems, solutions and consequences of making specific design decisions. This paper presents, Proteus-a framework which is intended to support the development of adaptable software architectures using design patterns. The main concepts of Proteus are illustrated by way of a home appliance control system. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.