Pair programming is a pretty big movement in the software world and advocates of pair programming often believe all software should be worked on by two people. The question: "Why practice pair programming?", has lots of really well thought out answers. But after some google searching I have yet to read someone talking about what makes programming different.
The wikipedia entry on Pair Programming says nothing about pairing in other industries / professions. Neither does the Extreme Programming entry or the C2 entry
Why did pairing emerge in computer programming? Why is there a lot of literature on pair programming, that doesn't reference other professions? Here are a few possible thoughts:
- There are lots of professions where pairing would be as beneficial as in programming, but for what ever circumstantial reasons pairing emerged, and was squashed.
- Pairing exists in lots of other professions, but for some reason it's not as formalized as in programming.
- The pairing movement is just as big in other professions, but I just haven't heard about it or been able to find any information about it.
- Pairing doesn't exist nearly to the extent as it does in computer programming because there is something fundamentally different about writing software.
I don't really know which of those thoughts I believe is true. But I am surprised that pairing seems to have emerged from programming, and it doesn't appear to have emerged for other industries. Is programming really that different from other kinds of knowledge professions?
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