4 ms·

BFS may not feel very relevant for front end development, but second time the author encountered it in an interview should have been a clue that it's worth lear

by shoyer 10y ago

BFS may not feel very relevant for front end development, but second time the author encountered it in an interview should have been a clue that it's worth learning. The world is full of not-entirely-relevant systems that you need to master to succeed. Tech interviewing is just another one of them. The good news is that once you know what they're looking for (and yes, there are books) it can be studied in a straightforward way. Think of it as a standardized test, with all the associated virtues (consistency) and faults (dehumanization).

mariodiana 10y ago
The second time he encountered it should have been a clue that interviewers are likely bored of interviewing and just googling "tech interview questions" and downloading the first set that catches their eye. It is this alone that makes BFS "worth learning" by heart.
Fuxy 10y ago
See some of us never tested that well. I sure as hell didn't but I seem to be ok when it comes to coding ability.
pmiller2 10y ago
> Think of it as a standardized test, with all the associated virtues (consistency) and faults (dehumanization). Except that it's not standardized at all.
- shoyer 10y ago
  Obviously, your mileage may vary. But at least at large companies (e.g., Google) the CS fundamentals you need to know to pass a coding interview are indeed pretty standard, and well described in books such as "Cracking the Coding Interview". BFS is absolutely on that list. Yes, I had to relearn it in preparation for my Google interview, but it was something I was ready for when it came up. And I would claim I'm a better software engineer for it -- graph search and data structures are topics that come up in lots of different contexts and for which understanding the basics can indeed make a big impact on your code. The list of these fundamentals is not that long, and the fact that it exists is a big part of the reason why coding bootcamps have been so successful.

by shoyer 10y ago

mariodiana 10y ago

The second time he encountered it should have been a clue that interviewers are likely bored of interviewing and just googling "tech interview questions" and downloading the first set that catches their eye. It is this alone that makes BFS "worth learning" by heart.

Fuxy 10y ago

See some of us never tested that well. I sure as hell didn't but I seem to be ok when it comes to coding ability.

pmiller2 10y ago

> Think of it as a standardized test, with all the associated virtues (consistency) and faults (dehumanization). Except that it's not standardized at all.

shoyer 10y ago
Obviously, your mileage may vary. But at least at large companies (e.g., Google) the CS fundamentals you need to know to pass a coding interview are indeed pretty standard, and well described in books such as "Cracking the Coding Interview". BFS is absolutely on that list. Yes, I had to relearn it in preparation for my Google interview, but it was something I was ready for when it came up. And I would claim I'm a better software engineer for it -- graph search and data structures are topics that come up in lots of different contexts and for which understanding the basics can indeed make a big impact on your code. The list of these fundamentals is not that long, and the fact that it exists is a big part of the reason why coding bootcamps have been so successful.