Mobile Thursdays is our weekly roundup of the latest (or most interesting) in mobile, curated by our very own Laurence Veale. We publish on a Monday, simply to rival Luke W.

This week’s mobile extravaganza is brought to you by Conor O’Sullivan, one of our lead interaction designers who gesticulates wildly when he talks about design.

He’s put together a list of websites where you can find tried and true design patterns for both desktop and mobile, which, of course, should be used as a guide, rather than a prison.

Best desktop design pattern libraries

• Patternry
• UI Patterns
• Pattern Tap
• Yahoo Design Pattern Library
• 30 Essential Controls, from Designing Web Interfaces

“Patternry is a great community driven user interface design pattern library from Pattern Factory,” Conor says. “They define most patterns under the following headings:

• What problems does the pattern solve?
• When should you use it?
• How should you use it?
• Why use it?

“They also include reference images and code snippets and links to other related sites.”

Best mobile design pattern and inspiration libraries

• Pttrns
• Lovely UI
• Mobile Awesomeness
• Mobile Design Pattern Gallery

How to use design pattern libraries

Conor points to an article in Smashing Magazine from 2009, 40+ Helpful Resources On User Interface Design Patterns by Jacob Gube, who gives a good overview of design patterns and how designers should use them: “If there is a commonly reoccurring need for a particular solution, . . . there is a great probability that someone has – by now – solved that need . . . .”

What design patterns do you use? Do you find them helpful or too limiting?