Preface It seems a long time ago (two years!) that I received the initial encouragement for this book from Paul Becker, an editor at the time with Addison-Wesley. I remain grateful to Paul for his help, and to his successor, John Neidhart, who took over as editor when Paul left. I am also grateful for the encouragement of John Vlissides, who is the Patterns Series editor and who has been a supporter of mine for all three of my books. John Vlissides is also, of course, one of the four authors of Design Patterns . John and his co-authors--Erich Gamma, Ralph Johnson, and Richard Helm--produced the work that not only established a list of important patterns that every developer should know, but also set a standard for quality and clarity that I have aspired to attain in my own writing. In addition to relying heavily on Design Patterns , I have benefited from the use of many other books; see Bibliography on 439. In particular, I have depended on The Unified Modeling Language User Guide Booch for its clear explanations of UML. For concise and accurate help on C# topics, I have consulted C# Essentials Albahari almost daily. I have also repeatedly drawn on the insights of C# and the .NET Platform Troelsen, and for realistic fireworks examples, I have consistently consulted The Chemistry of Fireworks Russell. As the present book began to take shape, several excellent reviewers helped to guide its progress. I would like to thank Bill Wake for his early reviews. Bill never ceases to amaze me in his ability to catch the subtlest errors while simultaneously providing advice on overall direction, content, and style. I would also like to thank Steve Berczuk and Neil Harrison. In particular, they hit on the same key point that the book needed more introductory material for each pattern. Their comments drove me to rework the entire book. It is much stronger now because of their advice. With the help of editors and reviewers, I was able to write this book; but, the text of a book is just the beginning. I would like to thank Nick Radhuber and the entire production staff for their hard work and dedication. Their work renders text into what is to this day its most usable form--a book! Steve Metsker ( Steve.Metsker@acm.org) Excerpted from Design Patterns in C# by Steven John Metsker All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
