From pairing programming to pairing

Everyone familiar with extreme programming knows that in the twelve practices of extreme programming, a very important practice is Pair programming, that is, two people sit in front of the same computer, use the same keyboard and mouse to develop the same module. One module is responsible for code typing, and the other is responsible for keeping an eye on possible errors, including low-level errors and directionality errors. In addition, when one problem is hard to solve for one of them and is exactly the strength of another person, the role will change.

However, for some reason, I have never been able to implement Pair programming. Although I intentionally implement some practices in extreme programming in my work, however, a person cannot perform Pair programming. (Unless I separate myself, or I can only split my mind ).

However, by chance, I realized the benefits of my work. On that day, a colleague received a task to design the internal network of the company and draw a network topology. He is very familiar with network configuration and installation, so he quickly began to draw tables, draw pictures, and start his work. At that time, I had nothing to do, so I moved a chair and sat next to him.

In my conscious moments, we have finished our work. First, we had a simple discussion about network deployment, and determined the network segments where all computers should be located. Because of the adoption of the subnet mask 255.255.255.255.192, this is something we have never used before, so when he draws a table, I help him calculate the minimum number of our IP addresses. The result is that the last number is greater than 192.

Next we discuss how to determine the number of computers in the company, including the number of servers, so that he can determine the number of rows in the table. And quickly entered the serial number of the computer user. And fill in the necessary information. The issue of IP Address allocation will soon be completed. As we kept talking, we avoided many spelling mistakes and did not miss any computer, and everything went smoothly.

Then we need to draw a picture to show the distribution of devices in the network. At the beginning, he planned to use the drawing tool in Excel, but as we all know, the drawing function of the Office itself is not enough to draw some professional images, so I recommend that you use the insert object method to add the image of Visio.

He thought about it and agreed with me. So we switched to Visio and began to draw a network topology.

However, we soon found that there was a problem with the picture drawn in Visio, and the text was not very clear due to the smooth corner operations, so he decided to add text manually in Excel after drawing the image.

The figure was quickly drawn. He began to add a rectangular box, set its background color and border line to colorless, and then added necessary explanatory text to it.

It has been almost an hour since the time passed. He is a little tired and his work efficiency is also somewhat reduced. I suggest that I complete the rest of the work for him. He agreed. Two minutes later, all the work is done.

Next we checked again, and there were no omissions or errors. So our work is complete.

From the above we can see that, in fact, this method can not only be used in the programming process, but also can be used in some work at ordinary times. I think everyone must have used this method. I think there will always be a consultant around when playing games or playing cards in the dormitory of a university. Isn't that the correct way? Haha.

Pairing is indeed a very effective way. if used properly, we can not only improve our work efficiency through complementing each other, but also reduce errors. The most important thing is that this method is very helpful for everyone to improve together, which is a very good result for a team.