I meant the tone of the response. Specifically, mocking my OP by adding 'or whatever' at the end was distracting. I think the substance of dgemm's comment has

I meant the tone of the response. Specifically, mocking my OP by adding 'or whatever' at the end was distracting. I think the substance of dgemm's comment has merit though. It could be Amazon was trying to place the candidate so were assessing the breadth of his/her skill. My OP was more generalized. Most positions in software don't require fine-grained understanding of algorithms and data structures, but interviewers nevertheless focus on those. A general understanding is good enough along with more important factors: Are they talented at what we're hiring them for? Are they an asshole? Will they finagle their way out the door and on home when production is on fire?