new to XP

[Charles Dupin]

I am new to XP, how would you define XP in few words.
Thanks

[Lasse Koskela]

Read this and this for starters.

[John Mathew]

XP philosophy stress a lot on pair programming, Automated tests, refactoring, continuous integration and short iterative cycle.
The book Xtremeprogramming Explained by Kent Beck is an excellent book, I would say not just for XP but for the development process as a whole. XP has proved successful in short to medium scale projects, but I'm not sure about large scale projects.

[Junilu Lacar]

Hi "Rajeev",
Welcome to the JavaRanch! Please update your profile and change your publicly displayed name so that it conforms with the JavaRanch Naming Policy. Thanks for your cooperation.

[Anindya Bagchi]

XP or extreme programming is basically a bunch of new ideas to programming resulting in improved productivity. For instance, you can develop unit test before coding and incrementally test and baseline each module along with your testing partner so that a defined unit (use case or similar) is delivered in a defined and short time frame. Sometimes you can decide to do nightly builds or drastic changes in team sizes, project management ideas(like not having a seperate development and test teams), code management ideas (like refactoring) etc. None of these ideas are etched in stone so find out the mix or transition path that works for you and follow it. Lot of people (including myself) have benefited from it - but if you want to go after the hoopla rather than the idea/substance, you may not necessarily have a good experience with XP.

[Ilja Preuss]

I don't think that any of the practices of XP really is new. What *is* new is the way in which they are put to gether to a whole.

[Payam Fard]

John,
Which one of Beck's books are you talking about? I did a search on amazon, I got the following three books:
1) Test Driven Development: By Example
2) Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change
3) Planning Extreme Programming
Thanks,
Payam.

[Lasse Koskela]

2) Extreme Programming Explained

[S Saunders]

I am also new to XP programming and have just recently taken interest in it with my team starting unit testing.
I have heard the term "agile software" and wonder if it is related to xp or another philosophy altogether.
Could someone explain the similarities/differences?
Thanks,
Steve

[Lasse Koskela]

Originally posted by S Saunders:
I have heard the term "agile software" and wonder if it is related to xp or another philosophy altogether.

Well, I remember seeing a company named Agile Software... If you weren't talking about the company, then the term was probably used for referring to "agile software development".
Agile software development is a broad definition of a software process, which embraces change by focusing on short iterations -- enabling change of direction more quickly than a water fall process, for example. In other words, agile software development is about short bursts and making directional corrections between each burst.
XP is one of several agile methods.
You might want to check out the article collection at agilealliance.com for more details about agile software development.
[ May 16, 2003: Message edited by: Lasse Koskela ]

[Ilja Preuss]

Originally posted by S Saunders:
I have heard the term "agile software" and wonder if it is related to xp or another philosophy altogether.

Agile Software Development is referring to a family of processes including XP, SCRUM, DSDM, Crystal etc.
A couple of years ago, these where called "lightweight methodologies". One day, the proponents of those processes held a meeting to see how much they had in common. It seems as if it was quite a bit - among other things, they thought that "lightweight" was quite misleading and decided to gather themself under the banner of "Agile Software Development". They set up and subscribed to the "Agile Manifesto", which describes their common beliefs and is more or less a "definition" of Agile Software Development. Later on, they formed the "Agile Alliance" to "market" their ideas.
Nowadays, "agile" seems to degenerate into a buzzword - even Microsoft is selling "Software for the agile Business"... :roll:
So, wether your spotting of "Agile Software" referred to XP and the likes, depends highly on where you saw it...
[ May 16, 2003: Message edited by: Ilja Preuss ]