Yet, advises E. William Horne, systems architect at William Warren Consulting, the boss should sit through a code review if possible. "She might spot hidden agendas, grandstanding, wishful thinking or feigned interest that you may miss because your head is inside the machine," Horne says.

Scott Butler, a senior sales engineer at Servoy USA, has seen some departments that have the same developers that write the code, doing each other's code review. "If you have a very good experienced, small team, then this is fine," he says. "However, you may have a team of developers with varying skills. Sometimes the initial reaction is to still have everyone participate in code review so that you don't hurt anyone's feelings. This is a mistake. Code review should be done by your best programmers or analysts."

So much for consensus. Because "who else ought to be in the room" generates widely varying opinions.

Who Should Participate

The participants' roles depend, to some degree, on the nature and purpose of the code review and the experience of the people involved.