Solo programming vs pair programming

Abstract

Program debugging is a process to locate and fix the bugs or defects responsible for a symptom violation in a computer program, thus making it behave as expected. Pair programming is a methodology in which two programmers share the same employed device and environment, collaboratively working on the same design, algorithm, code, and test. Most academic effort in pair programming has been spent on how pair programmers design a program system and how they implement it, rather than on how they debug it. In our study, we recruited two kinds of groups, solo and pair, to perform a program-debugging task in a time-restricted lab session. Based on our collected study data, we carefully examined the performance and strategy differences between the solo and pair programmer. We found evidence that working collaboratively may more efficient, not only when programming, but also when debugging. Further more, we present several methodologies, that can be adopted during academic practice to help students improve their debugging skills.