Why the Custom designs don't have a Pattern column in the design table?

[#1]

The design tables from the Classical design platform usually have a pattern column, which contains entries that summarize the run in the given row, like "+--", "000", or "+++". Why the Custom designs don't have a pattern column in the design table?  

[#2]

Good Question. I think it's because it would be very difficult to name the experiments consistently. If you have characters like "+0-", how would you name the first, second and third level of a categorical variables? What, if there are 4 or 11 categories? How to name a level between + and 0 for a continuous factor? Nobody would be able to understand the nomenclature. 

What pattern would you expect to see? If you have an example, you could build a pattern on your own for a more complex than FF and classical designs. But it probably will not work for arbitrary Custom Designs.

See also pattern column description for what is available: Make Table (jmp.com)

Maybe there is a better anwer from JMP staff?

[#3]

In addition to the thoughts of @Georg here's my wild guess supported by reverse logic and conspiracy theories. I'm old enough to have learned classic DOE construction (optimal design theory wasn't very popular at all because there weren't lots of computers powerful enough to handle the underlying computational work on many people's desktops just yet...there I've really dated myself) with pencil and paper and using Yates algorithms to build 2 level full and fractional factorial designs...and the plus/minus/zero notation was a key part of that construction work.

So as SAS built JMP from it's earliest versions (remember JMP DOE? I do.) the JMP developers tried to keep some familiar notation in the application to ease the transition of us pen and pencil types into the wild new world of actually letting a computer come up with a design. Kind of like a little JMP security blankie for some of us? And the legacy lives on.

Just a hunch...and I could be very wrong...but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

[#4]

I'm with Pete.  To be honest I never understand the purpose of this column?  I have never used it for any analysis in my 35+ years of analyzing experiments.