A few points regarding CS 101/201 data structures and algorithm coding interviews. The coding interview is a new phenomenon. In the 1990’s and early 00’s, the

A few points regarding CS 101/201 data structures and algorithm coding interviews. The coding interview is a new phenomenon. In the 1990’s and early 00’s, these type of interviews were rare. Typical interviews were more well rounded with questions about interests (what do you want to do), past experience (what have you done), personality and culture (how do you like to work), as well as some technical and coding questions, often relevant to the actual job to be performed. Also some brain teasers like “why are manhole covers round” which Google has since condemned. As someone who works largely on complex algorithms and mathematically oriented software such as video compression, speech recognition, and gesture recognition, I can say from experience that these tests frequently have nothing to do with what algorithm developers actually do. These are solved problems in CS such as how to sort data, how to implement a hash table, etc. In practice, developers rarely reinvent the wheel but rather use existing implementations in libraries or source code. The coding interview questions tend therefore to discriminate against older, more experienced developers who are many years past CS 101 or never took these classes. About half of practicing developers are “self-taught” which typically means they come from some other STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, or Mathematics) field where they learned to develop software by doing, not by taking CS classes. The tests tend to discriminate against them as well. As for women and underrepresented minorities, which typically seems to mean people with visible African ancestry and Hispanics with visible American Indian ancestry, this is difficult for me to judge. But in general the CS101/201 data structures and algorithm coding interviews are not a test of the skills used in most (not all) professional software development. What we can say is that these tests are also not blind tests of technical skill. They are analogous to the bad old days when orchestras auditioned prospective musicians by viewing the musician playing and few women ever made it through. The introduction of blind auditions where the candidates performed behind a sheet and with other measures to hide their gender, race, and other presumably unimportant factors — only the actual music was evaluated — seems to have resulted in an increase in women passing the auditions.