Pair Programming is an agile software development technique in which two programmers work together on the same development work at the same time. Many variants exist for this practice, each having there own merits and drawbacks.

From a business perspective, many companies are skeptical and critical of this practice because it incurs cost. Whether that cost is measured by time or by labor hours, determining a measure of success for pair programming is not an easy thing to do. In a world where metrics and numbers define ‘the bottom line’ it is no surprise that pair programming is not used everywhere.

What does it provide for the business of product & software development? The benefits definitely outweigh the drawbacks from a developer perspective. Our Evan Light talks about the aspects of testing practices in pairing, tools, and many other secrets to unlocking the power pairing.

Evan Light (@elight) is a software developer with nearly 20 years of professional experience. Having a passion for community service, Evan has spent several years as a volunteer EMT. In 2008 Evan founded the Ruby DCamp “unconference” which he continues to organize and run each year. He is a respected member of the Ruby programming community and has spoken at several Ruby-related conferences over the years.

Evan has an extensive background in remote pair programming and recently spoke at RubyNation in Silver Springs, Maryland on the subject. Evan’s talk was titled “Remote Pairing From the Comfort of Your Own Shell” where he spoke about his challenges & experiences in pair programming over the years and what has tools he uses today.

Resources

eXtreme Programming Explained - http://www.amazon.com/Extreme-Programming-Explained-Embrace-Change/dp/0201616416

Pomodoro technique -

Agile Definition of Pair Programming -  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pair_programming

#PairWithMe - http://www.pairprogramwith.me/

Ruby DCamp - http://rubydcamp.org and http://evan.tiggerpalace.com/articles/2012/10/06/the-dcamp-manifesto/

Vagrant - https://www.vagrantup.com/

Tmux - http://tmux.sourceforge.net/

Tmate - http://tmate.io/

Vimux - https://github.com/benmills/vimux

My .emacs.d - https://github.com/elight/.emacs.d

Pomodoro Technique - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomodoro_Technique

RubyMine - https://www.jetbrains.com/ruby/

Readme Driven Development - https://oncletom.io/talks/2014/okfestival/#/

J.B. Rainsberger “Integration Tests are a Scam” - http://vimeo.com/80533536

nitrous.io - https://www.nitrous.io/

Screen Hero - https://screenhero.com/

RubyNaition - http://www.rubynation.org/schedule/index

Pairing Staircase - http://itnaut.com/pairing_staircase

Evan on Twitter - https://twitter.com/elight: @elight

Evan’s Site - http://tripledogdare.net or http://evan.tiggerpalace.com