The Life of a Mob Programmer
Mob programming is a software development practice that brings together three to five developers all working on the same thing at the same time. There's one computer, one keyboard, one task, and one group of people working together. Thomas Desmond uses mob programming full time on all production software because of the quality of the software produced. His team consistently has no reported bugs in production, and at one point they went a year and a half with no reported bugs in production. Join Thomas as he shares what mob programming is, what it is like to be a mob programmer, the benefits we get out of it, and some negatives about it as well. You'll leave excited about mob programming and thinking about how you can apply its principles in your own environments.
Thomas Desmond is a senior software engineer, having spent the last four years at Hunter Industries as a full-time Mob Programmer. At Hunter Industries all production code must be developed as a mob. There are currently nine mobs working on production software that have successfully released multiple applications ranging from desktop, web, and mobile apps. Hunter had an outstanding year and a half of no reported bugs in production due to the success of the Mob Programming Team. Thomas believes in the quality that Mob Programming produces and the extreme programming practices that come along with it. He wants to share his experiences so that others can innovate and improve their programming experiences. Thomas has acted as a university instructor incorporating mob programming into the classroom environment. He also has multiple technical courses released to the online learning platform Thinkster.io. Thomas Desmond can be reached directly on Twitter @ThomasJDesmond or his personal website TheTomBomb.com.