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>Does anyone really ask you to write this kind of code in interviews Whoh!! All big IT companies ask these type of questions.. but mostly to graduate students

>Does anyone really ask you to write this kind of code in interviews Whoh!! All big IT companies ask these type of questions.. but mostly to graduate students and less experienced candidates.. but some companies might ask it to a 10 year old programmer as well..

throwaway2016a 10y ago
> All big IT companies ask these type of questions. Careful with absolutes. Although I used the word "any" in my post so I guess I shouldn't talk. Having worked at some large tech companies I can say definitely it is not "all" Some of these examples are 90+ lines of code which is why I ask. It would not be unrealistic with that much code that candidate will be sitting in the interview room for a half hour+ coding just one question. Several of these are borderline trick questions or only test your ability to memorize. For example, I learned Dijkstra’s algorithm in school 10+ years ago but if you were to ask me to implement it without reading the algorithm I wouldn't be able to. Asking graph data structure questions, sure. But here are more effective ways to know if a candidate will be a good fit than asking them to implement one of these. Use these as your interview test questions and all you are testing is the ability for the candidate to regurgitate algorithms. None of these test creative problem solving.
- adrianratnapala 10y ago
  The thing about Dijkstra's algorithm is that it't just the obvious one that you would think of if you had never been introduced to the problem before. I'm pretty sure I "invented" it myself at least twice, and then forgot it. Kudos to Dijkstra for nailing it down, but I think we do students a disservice by invoking his name all the time, thus making it seem scary.
  - setr 10y ago
    >Kudos to Dijkstra for nailing it down, but I think we do students a disservice by invoking his name all the time, thus making it seem scary. Ofc, going the other way, once they realize Djikstra's algo is simple makes every other named algo less scary And finally they (hopefully) realize such naming is a stupid thing to be scared by and disregard it entirely
Jtsummers 10y ago
> but some companies might ask it to a 10 year old programmer as well.. I'm glad I wasn't interviewing at 10. I could program, but couldn't have handled any of these algorithms.
sospep 10y ago
not saying these companies[0] wont ask these types of questions, but at least they wont ask you to answer them on a whiteboard [0] https://github.com/poteto/hiring-without-whiteboards https://github.com/poteto/hiring-without-whiteboards related HN discussion thread[1] [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13874026 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13874026

throwaway2016a 10y ago

> All big IT companies ask these type of questions. Careful with absolutes. Although I used the word "any" in my post so I guess I shouldn't talk. Having worked at some large tech companies I can say definitely it is not "all" Some of these examples are 90+ lines of code which is why I ask. It would not be unrealistic with that much code that candidate will be sitting in the interview room for a half hour+ coding just one question. Several of these are borderline trick questions or only test your ability to memorize. For example, I learned Dijkstra’s algorithm in school 10+ years ago but if you were to ask me to implement it without reading the algorithm I wouldn't be able to. Asking graph data structure questions, sure. But here are more effective ways to know if a candidate will be a good fit than asking them to implement one of these. Use these as your interview test questions and all you are testing is the ability for the candidate to regurgitate algorithms. None of these test creative problem solving.

adrianratnapala 10y ago
The thing about Dijkstra's algorithm is that it't just the obvious one that you would think of if you had never been introduced to the problem before. I'm pretty sure I "invented" it myself at least twice, and then forgot it. Kudos to Dijkstra for nailing it down, but I think we do students a disservice by invoking his name all the time, thus making it seem scary.
- setr 10y ago
  >Kudos to Dijkstra for nailing it down, but I think we do students a disservice by invoking his name all the time, thus making it seem scary. Ofc, going the other way, once they realize Djikstra's algo is simple makes every other named algo less scary And finally they (hopefully) realize such naming is a stupid thing to be scared by and disregard it entirely

Jtsummers 10y ago

> but some companies might ask it to a 10 year old programmer as well.. I'm glad I wasn't interviewing at 10. I could program, but couldn't have handled any of these algorithms.

sospep 10y ago

not saying these companies[0] wont ask these types of questions, but at least they wont ask you to answer them on a whiteboard [0] https://github.com/poteto/hiring-without-whiteboards https://github.com/poteto/hiring-without-whiteboards related HN discussion thread[1] [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13874026 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13874026