《领域驱动设计》书中在书面的设计文档小节中讲到：每个敏捷过程对于文档编写都有自己的原则，极限编程提倡不适用额外的设计文档，让代码自己来表达含义，但将代码作为设计文档有他的局限性。会使读者负担过多的细节问题。尽管代码的行为是明确的，但并不意味着是明显的。一个行为背后的含义会很难表达出来。团队内部大量的口头交流能够给代码阅读提供一些上下文环境的分析和指导，但也是暂时和局限的，并不只是开发人员需要理解模型。口头交流在语义上弥补了代码的太过细节的问题，但任何规模的团队还是需要能够提供稳定性和共享能力的书面文档，然而编写能够真正帮助团队生产优秀软件的书面文档是一个挑战。
我认为代码、口头交流和文档都很重要，我们不能绝对的站在任何一边。在敏捷过程中不能要求非常详细的文档，也不能误解敏捷开发而不要任何文档。《敏捷文档》描述了面对面沟通和文档的一些主要特点：
| Face-to-face communication | Documentation |
| Direct interaction Face-to-face communication allows for quick question-and-answer cycles. You ask something, someone answers, you ask back on a specific detail, you get a more precise answer, someone else offers their ideas and so on. Face-to-face communication involves people in a very direct way. |
Self-determined pace Different people grasp information at different speeds. Many people find they still have questions when a discussion is over – questions they didn’t think of in the heat of the debate. Documents, however, allow people to read at their own pace, going back and forth through the material as they need to. |
| Non-verbal communication People don’t communicate through words exclusively. A large part of communication takes place in a non-verbal way – through sound, gestures and subconscious body language. These things are possible only through face-to-face communication. |
Introvert communication While some people love to engage in debate, others don’t. Introverted people are sometimes painfully silent during discussions, though they may have a lot to say. They have their say more easily when they are given the chance to write things down, as this allows them to have second thoughts and take time to reflect. |
| Personal involvement Talking to each other means getting to know each other. Building trust happens much faster among people who are in the same room than among people who communicate through writing only. |
Scalability Documents can be made widely available. You can address an almost unlimited number of people at a time. Moreover, documents can reach the members of a distributed team – people working in different places. |
| Fast availability In a well-organised project, there are Experts In Earshot (Cockburn 1998) readily available for answering questions you may have. Discussions can come up on the spur of the moment. Documents may be available as well, but time goes by until documents are written and made available. |
Long-term availability Once a project reaches its end the team disperses – experts may no longer be available. The software, however, will still need maintenance or even refactoring. Only written documents are available beyond the limits of the actual project. |
通过以上对比可以发现，面对面沟通和文档并不是对立的，而是互为补充的，就像我们读书学习一样，我们需要从书本和老师的授课中学习。
