In 1996, something odd happened at OOPSLA, a conference on object‑oriented programming. The keynote in a room full of software developers was delivered—not by a programmer, but by an architect. It was odd enough that even the architect on stage seemed baffled to be there.

“Well, this is really strange for me. I’m giving a talk in front of all of you, but I don’t know the first thing about what you do.”

Why would an architect with no software background give the keynote at a developers’ conference?

That architect was Christopher Alexander. In 1977 he published A Pattern Language, which proposed using a “pattern language” to describe and document building and city design. In one sentence, his idea was to catalog in a given context (A), a solution (C) to a problem (B).

Inspired by that idea, Cunningham and Kent Beck brought pattern languages into software—and the design patterns developers talk about today began to take shape.

This excerpt comes from my book A Technical Travel Guide for Beginning Developers. In the chapter on design patterns I explain how Alexander first proposed pattern languages in architecture, how the idea crossed into software, why patterns help, and how to use them—as plainly as I could.

The book is not only about design patterns.

It’s organized in three parts.

Part 1 focuses on code: what “good code” means, bugs, debugging, version control, and a tour of several programming languages.

Part 2 is about the environment: how servers, cloud, the web, and databases evolved to where they are today, plus monitoring, pipelines, microservices, and more.

Part 3 is about life as a developer: why we care so much about code, how to grow, how to build good teams, open‑source spirit, and—toward the end—changing jobs as an experienced hire.


Glancing at the table of contents, you might think I crammed in an eclectic mix of topics—and I did. I wanted breadth. For juniors just starting out, I tried to cover as many keywords as they’ll meet on the road ahead.

Because the scope is wide, I didn’t go deep on everything—that’s for readers to explore. I wrote hoping the book would give newcomers a map of concepts and how they connect.


A Technical Travel Guide for Beginning Developers opened for pre‑orders and officially published on November 10, 2023. Pre‑order links:


I’d planned for about 300 pages, but as I filled in the material it grew into a thick book of over 600.

It’s my first time writing a book; I traded sleep to finish it. I hope many people read it—hence this long‑winded introduction.