"My expectation simply is that a solid candidate would be able to figure out anything on that list given a reasonable amount of time commensurate to their caree

"My expectation simply is that a solid candidate would be able to figure out anything on that list given a reasonable amount of time commensurate to their career level." The point of the interview is to determine if they are in fact a 'solid candidate'! Also, sometimes very experienced engineers have difficulty thinking, communicating and writing code coherently even if they can 'discuss' project issues in detail. Here's a famous and interesting article on that [1] [1] https://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/ https://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/