Well, since I cannot find a way to delete this, I will comment on it.
I actually did find a pair for pair programming and considered it somewhat effective. The programming partners were people who were working for me and whom I had to introduce into the system and language. It allowed me to see what they had already understood and their way to approach things as well as demonstrating some things they had not tried yet. But I’m not sure if the perfect situation for pair programming is with your boss who is more experienced and points out any of your mistakes. Even though it happened with the best intentions, I guess it left a sour feeling of being caught.
It also only worked locally, because 95% of the communication never makes it to the screen/editor. There is quite a difference between simply changing something and changing something while explaining why you do it with some sentences.
I guess the perfect combination for pair programming are two people who are at a similar technical level, so they can really support each other. For these the ability to communicate in parallel might be less important, since they can understand what the other person does by themselves.
