General talk about software patterns

[Jason Baragry <baragry AT online.no>]

G'Day,

I've been debating with a few people what the difference is between patterns 
and micro-architectures and I'd appreciate some opinions from people here.

My understanding is that patterns are abstractions, whereas 
micro-architectures are actual implementations - collections of interacting 
objects that solve some problem.

So, micro-architectures can realise some patten or collection of patterns. 
Therefore, it should be possible to 'point to' a micro-architecture in some 
implemented system or UML model and say "that micro-architecture is playing 
the role 'blah' in the pattern 'blah'". Indeed, some research groups are 
working on tools to do just that. E.g., 
www.yann-gael.gueheneuc.net/ Work/Publications/Documents/WCRE04.ppt.pdf

However because some patterns are very close to the class level (e.g., the 
GoFs), it is easy to get confused between what a pattern is and what a 
micro-architecture is. Indeed in the original GoF paper, that actual makes 
that confusion:
"Design patterns act as building blocks for constructing more complex 
designs; they can be considered micro-architectures that contribute to 
overall system architecture."
*Design Patterns: Abstraction and Reuse of Object-Oriented Design (1993)*
Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson, John Vlissides. 
http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/gamma93design.html 

Is there some other way of seeing the relationship between patterns and 
micro-architectures?

thanks,

Jason