« Preface of Extreme Programming, Embrace Change

September 14, 2006 • ☕️ 1 min read

To some folks, XP seems like just good common sense. So why the “extreme” in the name? XP 
takes commonsense principles and practices to extreme levels. 
â —  If code reviews are good, we’ll review code all the time (pair programming). 
â —  If testing is good, everybody will test all the time (unit testing), even the customers 
(functional testing). 
â —  If design is good, we’ll make it part of everybody’s daily business (refactoring). 
â —  If simplicity is good, we’ll always leave the system with the simplest design that supports its 
current functionality (the simplest thing that could possibly work). 
â —  If architecture is important, everybody will work defining and refining the architecture all the 
time (metaphor). 
â —  If integration testing is important, then we’ll integrate and test several times a day 
(continuous integration). 
â —  If short iterations are good, we’ll make the iterations really, really short–seconds and 
minutes and hours, not weeks and months and years (the Planning Game).