Purpose: The Informal Signature should provide the organisation with all the information necessary so as to gain a sufficient understanding of the pattern so as to
decide on whether to implement it or not.

Fields:

Rationale: An explanation of why the pattern is appropriate in relation to the forces, context and problem.

Consequences: What should the context be after applying the pattern, in terms of positive and/or negative affects.

Related patterns: Hypertext links and references to other patterns indexed according to the components of the informal description.

Related documents: Name, location and authors of other information related to designing implementing and using this pattern

Known applications: A list of organisations where this pattern has been implemented. For each organisation a contact person is named for eventual reference.

Contributing authors: The names of those who have contributed to the construction of the pattern as well as the organisations where the authors have observed its use.

Hyperlinks: Links to other relevant places in pattern repository, and links to relevant URLs located on Internet.