Extreme Programming Refactored: The Case Against XP [Paperback]

Extreme Programming Refactored: The Case Against XP (featuring Songs of the Extremos) takes a satirical look at the increasingly hyped Extreme Programming methodology. It explores some quite astonishing Extremo quotes that have typified the XP approach quotes such as, "XPers are not afraid of oral documentation," "Schedule is the customers problem," "Dependencies between requirements are more a matter of fear than reality" and "Concentration is the Enemy."

In between the chuckles, though, there is a serious analysis of XPs many flaws. The authors also examine C3, the first XP project, whose team (most of whom went on to get XP book deals shortly before C3s cancellation) described themselves as "the best team on the face of the Earth". (In a later chapter, the authors also note that one problem which can affect pair programmers is overconfidence or is that "eXcessive courage"?). The authors examine whether the problems that led to C3s "inexplicable" cancellation could also afflict present-day XP projects.

In the final chapter (Refactoring XP) Matt and Doug suggest some ways of achieving the agile goals of XP using some XP practices (used in moderation) combined with other, less risk-laden methods.

Doug Rosenberg is the founder and president of ICONIX Software Engineering, Inc. (www.iconixsw.com). Doug spent the first 15 years of his career writing code for a living before moving on to managing programmers, developing software design tools, and teaching object-oriented analysis and design.

Doug has been providing system development tools and training for nearly two decades, with particular emphasis on object-oriented methods. He developed a unified Booch/Rumbaugh/Jacobson design method in 1993 that preceded Rational’s UML by several years. He has produced more than a dozen multimedia tutorials on object technology, including COMPREHENSIVE COM and Enterprise Architect for Power Users, and is the coauthor of Use Case Driven Object Modeling with UML (Addison-Wesley, 1999) and Applying Use Case Driven Object Modeling with UML (Addison-Wesley, 2001), both with Kendall Scott, as well as Extreme Programming Refactored: The Case Against XP (Apress, 2003) with Matt Stephens, Agile Development with ICONIX Process (Apress, 2005) with Matt Stephens and Mark Collins-Cope, and Use Case Driven Object Modeling with UML: Theory and Practice with Matt Stephens (Apress, 2007).

Matt Stephens is a Java developer, project leader, and technical architect with a financial organization based in Central London. He’s been developing software commercially for over 15 years, and has led many agile projects through successive customer releases. He has spoken at a number of software conferences on OO development topics, and his writing appears regularly in a variety of software journals and websites, including The Register and ObjectiveView.

Matt is the coauthor of Extreme Programming Refactored: The Case Against XP (Apress, 2003) with Doug Rosenberg, Agile Development with ICONIX Process (Apress, 2005) with Doug Rosenberg and Mark Collins-Cope, and Use Case Driven Object Modeling with UML: Theory and Practice with Doug Rosenberg (Apress, 2007).

Catch Matt online at www.softwarereality.com.