Statically checked documentation with design patterns

Over the past years, along with the increase in popularity of design patterns, some problems with the use of design patterns have been identified. The so-called tracing problem describes the difficulty in documenting software systems using design patterns. Initial approaches to solving the tracing problem have focused on guidelines for documenting design pattern roles and rules within a system, but experience has shown that both in the initial design, and especially in later code revisions, it is all too easy for code and documentation to diverge, rendering the documentation misleading. The authors present a flexible and extensible tool which enables designers to use design patterns in a safe and efficient way, which checks the design pattern rules, and which semi-automatically documents, and maintains the documentation of a software system.