Motif

Often, when we look at software trace fragments we recognize certain motifs such as client-server interaction, publisher-subscriber notifications, database queries, plugin sequence initialization, etc. The idea of this pattern name comes from motives⁶⁰ in mathematics. It is different from Master Trace (Volume 6, page 247) which corresponds to a normal use-case or working software scenario and may actually contain several Motifs as it is usually happens in complex software environments. On the other side of the spectrum there are software narremes (basic narrative units, page 386) and Macrofunctions (single semantic units, page 283). Motifs help to further bridge the great divide between software construction and software diagnostics with software narremes corresponding to implementation patterns, macrofunctions to design patterns, and motifs to architectural patterns although an overlap between these categories is possible.

⁶⁰ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motive_(algebraic_geometry)