The term was coined by architect Christopher Alexander and popularized by his 1977 book A Pattern Language.
Aliveness is one placeholder term for "the quality that has no name": a sense of wholeness, spirit, or grace, that while of varying form, is precise and empirically verifiable.
A single problem is documented with its typical place (the syntax), and use (the grammar) with the most common and recognized good solution seen in the wild, like the examples seen in dictionaries.
Elemental or universal patterns such as "door" or "partnership" are versatile ideals of design, either as found in experience or for use as components in practice, explicitly described as holistic resolutions of the forces in recurrent contexts and circumstances, whether in architecture, medicine, software development or governance, etc.
The most difficult part of having an outside expert apply a pattern language is in fact to get a reliable, complete list of the problems to be solved.
The idea expressed in a pattern should be general enough to be applied in very different systems within its context, but still specific enough to give constructive guidance.
Alexander gives each pattern a rating by zero, one or two stars, indicating how well they are proven in real-world examples.
Alexander sees the low-scale artifacts as constructive elements of the large-scale world, so they can be connected to a hierarchic network.
Though quite unspecific in its context, the forces in the "SECONDARY ACTIVITY" pattern are very similar to those in "WIRELESS TELEPHONE".
More generally, we could say that a good system should be accepted, welcomed and happily embraced as an enrichment of daily life by those who are meant to use it, or – even better – by all people it affects.
The same thinking can be applied to technical devices such as telephones and cars, to social structures like a team working on a project, or to the user interface of a computer program.
By focusing on the impacts on human life, we can identify patterns that are independent from changing technology, and thus find "timeless quality" (Alexander).
Christopher Alexander's patterns, for instance, each consist of a short name, a rating (up to two '*' symbols), a sensitizing picture, the context description, the problem statement, a longer part of text with examples and explanations, a solution statement, a sketch and further references.
Some examples from Alexander's works are WINDOW PLACE (helps define where windows should go in a room) and A PLACE TO WAIT (helps define the characteristics of bus stops and hospital waiting rooms, for example).
Even without the pattern description, these links, along with meaningful names, carry a message: When building a place outside where people can spend time ("PUBLIC OUTDOOR ROOM"), consider to surround it by stairs where people can sit ("STAIR SEATS").
Alexander draws a parallel to the hierarchy of a grammar – that is one argument for him to speak of a pattern language.
In order to enable this, his books do not focus strictly on architecture or civil engineering; he also explains the general method of pattern languages.
The pattern language approach has also been recommended as a way to promote civic intelligence by helping to coordinate actions for diverse people and communities who are working together on significant shared problems.
[7] Alexander's specifications for using pattern languages as well as creating new ones remain influential, and his books are referenced for style by experts in unrelated fields.
It is important to note that notations such as UML or the flowchart symbol collection are not pattern languages.
A recipe or other sequential set of steps to be followed, with only one correct path from start to finish, is also not a pattern language.
The solutions proposed in the book include suggestions ranging from how cities and towns should be structured to where windows should be placed in a room.
[13] The deck "Group Works: A Pattern Language for Bringing Life to Meetings and Other Gatherings" was published in 2011.