Abstract. Pair programming is one of the more controversial aspects of several Agile system development methods, in particular eXtreme Programming (XP). Various studies have assessed factors that either drive the success or suggest advantages (and disadvantages) of pair programming. In this exploratory study the literature on pair programming is examined and factors distilled. These factors are then compared and contrasted with those discovered in our recent Delphi study of pair programming. Gallis et al. (2003) have proposed an initial framework aimed at providing a comprehensive identification of the major factors impacting team programming situations including pair programming. However, this study demonstrates that the framework should be extended to include an additional category of factors that relate to organizational matters. These factors will be further refined, and used to develop and empirically evaluate a conceptual model of pair programming (success). 1 1

The literature on expertise is wide-ranging, both across many domains and within software development, however when findings from these are contrasted with literature on experience in pair programming, some startling differences become apparent. For example, knowledge seems to be a key feature in obtaining expertise, however there is little mention of core programming knowledge as a measure of expertise in the pair programming literature. This paper discusses these discrepancies, along with findings on the reliability of various types of rating, to provide context for the presentation of data from a survey of commercial pair programmers which aims to help clarify what factors are considered good indicators of pair programming expertise by different groups.

Abstract. Pair programming is one of the important practices of a lightweight development methodology namely eXtreme Programming (XP). It emphasizes the practice of two persons working together at a single computer terminal, to design, code and test computer programs. The effects of pair programming on software development in industrial organizations were studied and it was found that pair programming increases the productivity by 15%. This evidence created an interest in amongst community of computer science educators to apply pair programming in educational settings. We have conducted an experiment with the students of computer science courses to compare the learning efficiency of students when they adopt pair programming with that of students using traditional method to do laboratory exercises of short duration. The learning efficiency was measured by evaluating design documents, completion time, and marks obtained in a written test that was conducted after every exercise. Our research confirms that the adoption of pair programming improves the design ability, reduces time taken to do a laboratory exercise and increases the knowledge and programming skill.

This paper describes a formal experiment carried out to investigate the effect of the Personality factor conscientiousness on the effectiveness of Pair Programming as a pedagogical tool in higher Education. This experiment took place at the University of Auckland, using as subjects undergraduate students attending an introductory programming course. Conscientiousness was chosen because it has been shown to be the most consistent predictor of academic achievement. Our findings showed that differences in conscientiousness level did not significantly affect the academic performance of students who pair programmed, which could have been due to the short duration of the tasks used throughout the experiment. However, results revealed that another Personality factor- Openness to experience- presented a significant correlation with paired students ’ academic performance.

The interest in pair programming (PP) has increased recently, e.g. by the popularization of agile software development. However, many practicalities of PP are poorly understood. We present experiences of using PP extensively in an industrial project. The fact that the team had a limited number of high-end workstations forced it in a positive way to quick deployment and rigorous use of PP. The developers liked PP and learned it easily. Initially, the pairs were not rotated frequently but adopting daily, random rotation improved the situation. Frequent rotation seemed to improve knowledge transfer. The driver/navigator roles were switched seldom, but still the partners communicated actively. The navigator rarely spotted defects during coding, but the released code contained almost no defects. Test-driven development and design in pairs possibly decreased defects. The developers considered that PP improved quality and knowledge transfer, and was better suited for complex tasks than for easy tasks. 1.

Abstract — Pair Programming (PP) has been long researched in industry and academia. Although research evidence about its usefulness is somewhat inconclusive, previous studies showed that its use in an academic environment can benefit students in programming and design courses. In our study, we investigated the “human ” aspect of PP; in particular the effects that personality attributes may have on PP’s effectiveness as a pedagogical tool. We conducted a formal experiment at the University of Auckland to investigate the influence of personality differences among paired students using the Five-Factor Model as a personality measurement framework. The aim of our study was to improve the implementation of PP as a pedagogical tool through understanding the impact the variation in the personality profile of paired students has towards their academic performance. Our findings showed that differences in personality traits did not significantly affect the academic performance of students who pair programmed. In addition, the majority (88%) of students were satisfied with the PP experience and 87 % responded that their confidence level increased when pairing. Keywords-component; Pair programming; experimentation; personality type; five-factor model I.

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