Pat says: This book has enjoyed enormous commercial success since its advent only three years ago. Its appeal is centered around the "need for speed" in the business world.  The process described is flexible enough to allow requirements to change anytime during development (bound to be popular with managers).  It is also appealing to programmers because it is people-oriented, in contrast to the stilted and often ineffective technical management which many programmers experience in the real world.  For example, it advocates the avoidance of overtime (gasp) and thus the avoidance of programmer burnout.

The book is worth reading for its "twelve core practices" alone.  Yet the effectiveness of the extreme process is probably limited to small project teams (perhaps 12 or less) whose members are all committed to the process.  It is unlikely to succeed on large or distributed project teams.  And since it depends heavily on successful interaction among all parties, it may not be appropriate for more socially shy, unconfident or retiring programmers, talented though they may be.  The author freely admits all this.  To achieve best results, this process even requires that office space be set up to support it.  A halfway approach to the process might well come up short.

Students should read this book even if they don't agree with it, because the ideas in it are simply "going around" in the programming world.  This is actually one of many books about extreme programming, including a plethora of books attempting to make a case against it.