> The candidate can't remember what the "str" type is called, or how to find substrings in a string, or the difference between "==" and "is" for objects. They a

> The candidate can't remember what the "str" type is called, or how to find substrings in a string, or the difference between "==" and "is" for objects. They ask you to remind them if "join" is a method on sequences or on strings. They write "length()" when they mean "len()". If you're going to disqualify people for these kinds of errors, you're going to lose a lot of great and experienced candidates, and only hire the ones who have taken considerable amount of time to practice memorizing library functions and language quirks for whiteboard coding. At any given moment, I can probably go back and forth between 2 or 3 languages. I can probably "whiteboard code" in one language only. Anything other than that has a few days of ramp up until I'm back to where I used to be. This doesn't mean that I don't know a certain language. It means that in order to be a good programmer, my brain needs to temporarily forget a lot of things. Especially if I go back and forth between different languages. Memorization isn't proof of internalization. Especially when you're neglecting the fact that programs work with IDEs, and are used to typing code with keyboards (and not pencils and whiteboard markers). Someone mixing up length() and len() doesn't prove he isn't experienced or productive in python. It proves that he isn't experienced or productive in whiteboard coding.