 We
ran an experiment with 42 seniors at the University of Utah. Fourteen
of them worked alone. The rest worked in pairs doing pair-programming. All
students completed the same assignments.
Pair-programming
definitely does not cost twice as much! In their first assignment (I
call the "jelling-assignment") the pairs spent 60% more programmer
hours than the individuals. In the second assignment, they had gotten
used to this pair-programming thing. The pairs spent only 20% more
total time than the individuals. By the third assignment, the pairs
spent only 10% more time - so if an individual spent 10 hours on the
assignment, the pair worked together for 5 hours and 15 minutes.
In
all cases, the pairs passed about 15% more of the post-development test
cases. And, |
over 90% say they enjoy programming more and they feel more
confident in their work when pairing.
As
a post test to the experiment, all students worked individually to
complete one assignment. One student said of going back to solo
programming, "Without my partner, I feel like I lost half my brain."
North
Carolina State University |
