Some interesting points from Martin Fowler a few years ago on XP, patterns, design, etc. Was worth skimming through quickly.

Quoted: "enabling practices of continuous integration, testing, and refactoring, provide a new environment that makes evolutionary design plausible"

Quoted: "don't want to spend effort adding new capability that won't be needed until a future iteration. And even if the cost is zero, you still don't want to it because it increases the cost of modification even if it costs nothing to put in."

Quoted: " * Invest time in learning about patterns
* Concentrate on when to apply the pattern (not too early)
* Concentrate on how to implement the pattern in its simplest form first, then add complexity later.
* If you put a pattern in, and later realize that it isn't pulling its weight - don't be afraid to take it out again."

Quoted: "First keep in mind what you're drawing the diagrams for. The primary value is communication. Effective communication means selecting important things and neglecting the less important.
* keep them short
* don't try to address all the details (just the important ones)
* treat the resulting design as a sketch, not as a final design
"

dot from jacob

Quoted: Every programmer with a few years' experience or education has heard the phrase "premature optimization is the root of all evil." This famous quote by Sir Tony Hoare (popularized by Donald Knuth) has become a best practice among software engineers. Unfortunately, as with many ideas that grow to legendary status, the original meaning of this statement has been all but lost and today's software engineers apply this saying differently from its original intent. As computer systems increased in performance from MHz, to hundreds of MHz, to GHz, the performance of computer software has taken a back seat to other concerns. Today, it is not at all uncommon for software engineers to extend this maxim to "you should never optimize your code!" Funny, you don't hear too many computer application users making such statements. It is unfortunate that Hoare's comments have been twisted to imply that optimization is unnecessary.

Redot from jacob

Alexander's "Notes on the Synthesis of Form" was insightful, don't know why I haven't picked up and read "The Timeless Way of Building"