How can human beings implement a geometrical differentiating process successfully?

In the end, the lasting product of architecture is the shape and reality of the finished building. Everything in architecture comes from layout, organization, form, shape.

When A Pattern Language was first published, many architects who used it created buildings typical of the then current style of the 1970s and 1980s — unusual roof shapes, plywood sides, etc. Even though the plan, shape, volume, created by the patterns did not require (or even invite) this treatment, it was as if people only knew how to create an output by pouring it into the then popular, known, receptacle of available geometric forms. The result that came out was not what was required, because that form-language (the then-current developer’s architectural vernacular of the 1970s) was not capable of holding the content actually created by a living process. The resulting buildings often had a rather tired quality, looked like second-rate, not very good architecture. This was true whether the designer succeeded, or dod not succeed, in incorporating the patterns.
All this happened because people simply cannot create buildings without a form-language. Buildings are, in essence, and at root, geometrical. Even with the powerful tool of pattern-language helping them to conceive living structure (in plan, volume, and content) the lack of form language meant that this output could not be consolidated as coherent form.
Evidently, the real stuff, the core geometry of the created form lies — and must lie, at least much of it — at a level deeper than the level of the pattern language. The 1970s architecture which appeared in such examples (even when the positive content of the patterns was included) was based on a different and unsuitable language of form which was more basic, and which carried most of the style, and meaning, and geometry.
The same will be true of any contemporary process, living or not. The building forms generated by a living process as I have described it so far will still have to be pieced together in whatever language of forms, shapes, combinations is now current. Unless we can develop a new form-language with the capacity to generate the kinds of I have described, the inner content of living process cannot be consolidated by these older forms. To make the unfolding work successfully, a new form-language must be created which is capable of holding this content… and that means, it must be one which supports the formation of living centers. This requires innovations, technical solutions that are surprising, practical and simple. Without such work as a foundation, the results of unfolding — as they truly are — cannot be upheld or widely built, at all.

There is a distinction between a pattern and a form language, between what patterns attribute to the resulting form, and its geometry. What are the equivalent entities in software? It seems choice of programming language and libraries is less part of the pattern and more part of the form…? As is software architecture. The functional requirements and user experience, however, are more on the pattern language side. What else?

Alexander also points out that form languages “need to support the formation of living centers”, which implies that form languages can be better or worse suited to such a task. What are the equivalent features a software form language needs to have to better support unfolding?

Where, after all, when all else is said and done, should we look for shape and style and substance. As we begin to make a building, where should we get the building from, its shape, its style, so that the building ends up beautiful?

Also connected to Ryan Singer on pattern languages in his newsletter #3:

In spirit, this is similar to a breadboard. It defines the elements of the project and how they’re related. But a pattern language expresses far more relationships across more dimensions at a wider variety of scales.

At Basecamp and in Shape Up, we talk about flexible scope that enables a team to build “some version” of an idea within a fixed budget. That’s exactly what the pattern language is doing here. It defines the relationships that qualify a structure as being “some version” of the design. It specifies a space of possible physical configurations, not one specific configuration. (This is what shaping work at the right level of abstraction is about.)
[…]
This is profound. The “specification” — the pattern language — had so much latitude that it could lead the team to arrive at a configuration nobody could anticipate, while still satisfying the system of relationships that make it fulfill its purpose.

#book/The Nature of Order/2 The process of creating life/16 Form language and style#