Design Pattern Automation Toolkit

The "Design Pattern Automation Toolkit" -- an open-source tool, on SourceForge:

http://dpatoolkit.sourceforge.net/

As seen on the Gang-of-Four DesignPatterns discussion list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/gof-patterns/message/48

Requires .Net

It seems to support C# and VB.NET at this time. There's mention of Java support, but it's not clear if it can recognize or generate Java at this time.

Hmmmm... Interesting, but I'm not sure I'm impressed. Like, what does it do for me? -- JeffGrigg

Hey jeff, it allows u to use design patterns in ur design, when u can view the class diagrams , generates code stubbs (in java too!! dear wiki), and help for reverse engineering for .net aware languages!!

I can see how a tool like this might make it considerably harder for me to effectively utilize design patterns in my code. For a pattern to be most useful, it should emerge from the needs of the design, right? A tool like this encourages me to think hammer-first: "Well, I need a Composite pattern here. Let's get one from the toolkit! Now, how to shove this into the rest of the code...."

Other aspects of this project seem interesting, if a bit ambitious. If it can data-mine a pattern out of a snarl of old code, it might give me an interesting perspective, perhaps a direction in which to move. But code generation would not sit so well with me.

Refactorings are basically mechanical. Design is much less so. Give me a power screwdriver (or a RefactoringBrowser), but not a blueprint-generator. -- PhilGroce