I was reading up on abstract factory
pattern here, and I am not able to completely grasp its importance.
From what I can understand, it allows programmer to not specify instantiating the specific class. So, if there is a DocumentCreator factory and I need to create my resume then I wouldn't need to do this:
DocumentCreator creator = new ResumeCreator();
Instead I can do this with:
DocumentCreator creator = DocumentCreator.getInstance(resume); (I recall)
Does my understanding on this pattern correct and if it is not could you elaborate on its pros? Why is not specifying the concrete class such a big deal?
Also is the GOF book an easy read for someone newly acquainted with design pattern?