Not many interviewees will have the comfort level to ask the gatekeeper for some quiet time. I think interviewers should offer it proactively. Conventional wisd

Not many interviewees will have the comfort level to ask the gatekeeper for some quiet time. I think interviewers should offer it proactively. Conventional wisdom in interviews is to always offer a running commentary, because people like progress bars. Particularly since an interviewer will perceive time far more slowly than the person they're grilling. A common thought process might go something like this: inchoate thought; more structured visualizations and vague search over solution space; enough insights have accumulated; convince yourself that the solution is correct; nail down details. It's an additional skill to provide running commentary to strangers during this. The permutations problem -- which I've encountered and did fine, FWIW -- may be a poor question for most projects. I imagine only few require much thinking along those lines.