I wonder how strongly pair programming is correlated with open office plans. Depressing if true, but if pair programming offsets the distraction of open plans, there may be cases where it's more viable for a company to simply hire twice as many developers and save money on office space, just to get out of having to give people offices.

On the other hand, it seems like people doing pair programming in open plans would contribute to the overall noise and distraction- a warehouse full of pairs of people talking all the time would also be a bad scene. :(

Noise is definitely a problem if the space has poor acoustics. Some Pivotal offices have spent a lot of money on sound absorbing surfaces.

I can't speak for other companies. We don't do open plan for money, it's just that it's easier to work this way for the way that we work.

That said: for colocated teams of solo developers, or distributed teams, open plan is poison.

Office space isn't that expensive.

While cost IS a factor, the idea seems to be going round that open plan is genuinely superior. (Although rarely so superior that the executives partake...)

Right, startup companies do open-plan because it is cheap, not because any actual developers are more productive or happier that way. It's supposed to be something you put up with until the company can afford offices... Only that point got lost somewhere along the way.

Hell why doesn't GE just remodel their offices to look like garages, because obviously that's the reason that Apple was successful...

I think they've taken the Pivotal Labs (they even call them Predix Labs!) approach and do a LARGE amount of pairing.

You guys have had quite an influence :)

That's great!

For Labs, our best outcome is to put ourselves out of a job because the clients are teaching themselves.

They will do a corporate rollout of pair programming once they Six Sigma Black Belts are done doing their lean workouts ;).

Yep they pair or threesome. Theres actually alot of pressure to group up. We would pair all day most days when I worked there.

I take you disliked it? A lot of people do.

I prefer flow.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)

I don't think they're mutually exclusive.

Have you never had an interesting conversation and then looked up, realising that 4 hours had passed?

In my experience, I find it easier to focus with someone next to me than by myself. To the point that I take half as much Ritalin on pairing days than when I work alone.

Maybe you're right? It has to be the right person/people. Also, combine pairing with an open office and now you have two people with double the chances of being interrupted. So it's circumstantial.