Software Practices That Sound Good but Often Conflict with Humanity — Part A: Pair Programming

Good but difficult to execute well in the real world, due to human reasons.

Image credit: https://t2informatik.de/en/smartpedia/pair-programming/

In this article series:

• Part A: Pair Programming
• Part B: Mandatory Code Review *
• Part C: Code Traceability Matrix
• Part D: User Story Points Estimation

Pair Programming is a core rule of eXtreme Programming, the first Agile methodology.

Definition of Pair Programming: “All code to be sent into production is created by two people working together at a single computer.”

I agree with Robert C. Martin: Extreme Programming (XP) is the best Agile methodology — better than Scrum and the rest.

Yet, despite being both the first and the most effective, XP never gained widespread adoption. Why? In my view, there are two main reasons:

1. The Name
Management tends to dislike the term “Extreme Programming.” Neither word sits well — extreme sounds reckless, and programming makes it…