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Building Application Frameworks by Mohamed Fayad & Douglas Schmidt & Ralph Johnson Recommended

ISBN: 0 471 24875 4       Publisher: Wiley       Pages: 664       Price: £35-50

Categories:   object oriented

Reviewed by Colin Harkness in Overload OL38 (Jul 2000)

This is the first of a 3-volume set covering Application Frameworks. This volume covers the concepts and gives experience- based guidance to decision-makers on developing and using this technology. The other two volumes use case studies to examine real application frameworks and discuss what we can learn from them. This is, therefore, the key book and perhaps the only one students would require. (Note: the book mentions an instructor guide and gives links to supplementary material on the web. However, it appears this has not been written yet).

The chapters form a collection of articles by a large number of authors. They vary in style and their introductions sometimes repeat material. With so many concepts and ideas to take in, this is no bad thing. The authors and examples mainly come from industry research departments and academia. The result is that we are left to assume these frameworks were successful and that their authors were enlightened folk whom we should learn from. Where are all the failed projects we can learn from? I guess you do not win research funding by writing up your failures or those of your fellow researchers.

I found some of the chapters pretty heavy going. The 'who should read this book' has a laughably long list (about 20 different job titles). In reality I would recommend the reader should have a strong foundation in OO concepts, more than one (OO) language and some experience implementing and using such frameworks. It is not a book to read cover-to-cover. Dip into the chapters that you think will be useful. Recommended.

Johnson
AutoCAD, the Complete Reference (Second Edition) by Nelson Johnson  (Reviewed Mar 1992)
Database Models, Languages, Design by James Johnson [Highly Recommended]  (Reviewed Jul 1998)
Design Patterns - Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software by Gamma & Helm & Johnson & Vlissides [Recommended]  (Reviewed Aug 1995)
Design Patterns, Elements of Reusable OO Software by Gamma & Helm & Johnson & Vlissides [Highly Recommended]  (Reviewed Sep 1995)
Domain-Specific Application Frameworks by Mohamed Fayad & Ralph Johnson  (Reviewed Jul 2000)
Electronic Publishing Construction Kit by Scott Johnson  (Reviewed Mar 1997)
LABVIEW Graphical Programming by Gary Johnson [Recommended]  (Reviewed Nov 1996)
Troubleshooting and Configuring the Windows NT/95 Registry by C Johnson  (Reviewed Nov 1997)
Turbo C++ By Example by Johnson & Perry  (Reviewed Jan 1994)
Turbo C++ by Example by M Johnson & Greg Perry  (Reviewed May 1993)

Schmidt
Implementing the IEEE Software Engineering Standards by Michael Schmidt [Recommended]  (Reviewed Dec 2000)
Pattern Languages of Program Design ed. by Coplien & Schmidt  (Reviewed May 1996)
Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture Vol 2 by Douglas Schmidt [Recommended]  (Reviewed Sep 2000)
SCSI Bus and IDE Interface 2ed, The by Friedhelm Schmidt [Recommended]  (Reviewed Jul 1998)