How come there's pair programming and not pair... anything else?
Pair design! Pair writing! Pair data-analysis! Pair management!
Pair design! Pair writing! Pair data-analysis! Pair management!
The advantages of pair programming are things like:
• Reducing risk of mistakes / doing things sub-optimally
• Sharing knowledge between the people who are pairing
• Making it easier to stay focused
• Reducing risk of mistakes / doing things sub-optimally
• Sharing knowledge between the people who are pairing
• Making it easier to stay focused
None of these are programming-specific, except maybe that knowledge-sharing is unusually important (because benkuhn.net/blub/). I'd argue that the point about focus is *anti*-programming-specific: programming is much more conducive to flow states than most activities.
The main downside of pair programming is that it consumes the time of two people instead of one.
Maybe the balance of costs vs benefits is different? In programming there's a big difference between bad code and good code, so maybe "2x cost for better code" is more worthwhile?
Maybe the balance of costs vs benefits is different? In programming there's a big difference between bad code and good code, so maybe "2x cost for better code" is more worthwhile?
Still, I'd argue that the above applies *even more* to many other activities like design, writing, or management. So what is it about programming specifically that has made pairing catch on, vs elsewhere?
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