Our new patterns include the rosetta stone. This pattern provides a path to link disparate systems and their data formats. It comes from the historical rosetta stone which was a multilingual text used to decipher ancient languages. We use this as a sort of pathway to a common language for our application.
The Rosetta Stone Pattern Defined
Modern software often has multiple other systems that need to be integrated with. That means we need to pass data back and forth. The format and structure of the data we send can be challenging to map across multiple systems. The rosetta stone pattern approaches this problem by designing a single format that all of our data will transform into or be exported from. Thus, we always map to one set of data when pulling from other systems. Likewise, we have one format we generate that other systems are provided.
That avoids us having to map from each disparate system to every other system. We create a hub and spoke rather than a mesh network. Therefore, we have a dramatically reduced number of integration points that need to be addressed. Also, we have a set format to convert new systems into.
Applying The Pattern
There are two main ways to apply this pattern. One can either build a master format that combines the data from all of the desired integration systems or build what the solution needs as the master. The latter approach tends to be better as it focuses on the solution rather than other systems. We also are driving the format and structure instead of reacting to other systems. Finally, we have a static universal format that does not change based on external factors.
