5 ms·

Maybe it's just me being naive, but facebook has got to be one of the most awesome places that there is to work. I swear that every couple of months I hear abo

by blhack 16y ago

Maybe it's just me being naive, but facebook has got to be one of the most awesome places that there is to work. I swear that every couple of months I hear about a situation that basically comes down to this: Boss: "Hello, Ryan, we would like to do $impossible_thing"" Ryan: "Huh, that sounds kindof impossible. But I guess we could get a team of the smartest people in our industry together and build an entirely new suite of tools to make $impossible_thing into $totally_normal_thing..." Boss: "Yeah, do it!" 6 months later Ryan and boss (to internet): "Hey, guys, check out this thing we made. Here, you can have it for free. Have a nice day!"

sown 16y ago
This makes me being too dumb to work there burn even more.
- JakeSc 16y ago
  Likewise. In my experience with them, the interview questions are really specific and targeted, thus making it unlikely for everyone to know the precise answer. Unfortunately, they are indeed looking for an exact answer. So just because we couldn't recite an exact response with compilable code doesn't mean we're dumb. We just aren't experts in that particular topic. Hang in there!
- blhack 16y ago
  >This makes me being too dumb to work there burn even more. I looked at your profile and saw this: >a failure of a hacker who doesn't have the energy to do much of anything anymore Failure of a hacker? Pardon my language, but I fucking doubt it. Prove me wrong and tell me why you're a failure, please. I find myself falling into this ridiculous trap all the time. It's easy to do too... I mean, holy shit, I'm posting on hacker news, a place where multi-millionaires posting about their wildly successful startups is the norm. I'll find myself thinking that I'm a failure because I don't work at facebook, and I'll probably never be rubbing shoulders with people at the googleplex. I mean...my god, what a total worthless waste of space I am that I'm not a member of the top %0.001 of programmers in the US? Because my office isn't in some uber-cool San Francisco loft? Because cisco isn't employing a team of engineers to try and build switches that can handle the amounts of traffic that my data-center crushing websites produce? Because I'm not routinely completely changing the game in application development? That's ridiculous. I really really really highly doubt that you're a "failure of a hacker", the fact that you post here pretty much proves that you're not.
jpeterson 16y ago
Huh, that sounds kindof impossible. But I guess we could get a team of the smartest people in our industry together and build an entirely new suite of tools to make $impossible_thing into $totally_normal_thing... HBase has been around for a while, and is part of the Apache Hadoop project. You don't need Zuckerberg signing your checks to work on cool projects along with really smart people.
- blhack 16y ago
  I'm also talking about cassandra. Out of curiosity, am I wrong about this? Cassandra was developed by facebook, wasn't it? (I was asking because this was downvoted. I thought maybe I was mistaken about cassandra)
  - ahi 16y ago
    Yes, it was.
- blntechie 16y ago
  But their decision to choose HBase over Cassandra should be commended and to build on top of a new tool or create custom tools frequently, make them really cool. For me, they look cool by just sharing this. Not many big companies do this.
- fauigerzigerk 16y ago
  Very true, but on the other hand, those who do work on cool projects might want their checks signed by Zuckerberg. (Not me, but that's a different matter.)
  - jpeterson 16y ago
    ...those who do work on cool projects might want their checks signed by Zuckerberg. I can't understand why that would matter, and frankly I find the notion very depressing.
    - fauigerzigerk 16y ago
nspiegelberg 16y ago
I am currently working on the HBase project at Facebook. It's extremely fun! We try to sync up with the OS branch on a weekly basis. Additionally, FB actually has an Open Source team whose primary job is to find out how we can use current open source solutions or remove company-confidential material and open source more of our infrastructure. It gives you real pride to know that your company completely supports your desire to help the software developer community.
- blhack 16y ago
  Always remember that you are literally doing what people like me daydream about. That's awesome :)
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
axod 16y ago
idk if you really associate Facebook with quality engineering quite yet. Facebook is often broken with rough edges, odd engineering decisions all over, and quirks galore.

by blhack 16y ago

sown 16y ago

This makes me being too dumb to work there burn even more.

JakeSc 16y ago
Likewise. In my experience with them, the interview questions are really specific and targeted, thus making it unlikely for everyone to know the precise answer. Unfortunately, they are indeed looking for an exact answer. So just because we couldn't recite an exact response with compilable code doesn't mean we're dumb. We just aren't experts in that particular topic. Hang in there!
blhack 16y ago
>This makes me being too dumb to work there burn even more. I looked at your profile and saw this: >a failure of a hacker who doesn't have the energy to do much of anything anymore Failure of a hacker? Pardon my language, but I fucking doubt it. Prove me wrong and tell me why you're a failure, please. I find myself falling into this ridiculous trap all the time. It's easy to do too... I mean, holy shit, I'm posting on hacker news, a place where multi-millionaires posting about their wildly successful startups is the norm. I'll find myself thinking that I'm a failure because I don't work at facebook, and I'll probably never be rubbing shoulders with people at the googleplex. I mean...my god, what a total worthless waste of space I am that I'm not a member of the top %0.001 of programmers in the US? Because my office isn't in some uber-cool San Francisco loft? Because cisco isn't employing a team of engineers to try and build switches that can handle the amounts of traffic that my data-center crushing websites produce? Because I'm not routinely completely changing the game in application development? That's ridiculous. I really really really highly doubt that you're a "failure of a hacker", the fact that you post here pretty much proves that you're not.

jpeterson 16y ago

Huh, that sounds kindof impossible. But I guess we could get a team of the smartest people in our industry together and build an entirely new suite of tools to make $impossible_thing into $totally_normal_thing... HBase has been around for a while, and is part of the Apache Hadoop project. You don't need Zuckerberg signing your checks to work on cool projects along with really smart people.

blhack 16y ago
I'm also talking about cassandra. Out of curiosity, am I wrong about this? Cassandra was developed by facebook, wasn't it? (I was asking because this was downvoted. I thought maybe I was mistaken about cassandra)
- ahi 16y ago
  Yes, it was.
blntechie 16y ago
But their decision to choose HBase over Cassandra should be commended and to build on top of a new tool or create custom tools frequently, make them really cool. For me, they look cool by just sharing this. Not many big companies do this.
fauigerzigerk 16y ago
Very true, but on the other hand, those who do work on cool projects might want their checks signed by Zuckerberg. (Not me, but that's a different matter.)
- jpeterson 16y ago
  ...those who do work on cool projects might want their checks signed by Zuckerberg. I can't understand why that would matter, and frankly I find the notion very depressing.
  - fauigerzigerk 16y ago

nspiegelberg 16y ago

I am currently working on the HBase project at Facebook. It's extremely fun! We try to sync up with the OS branch on a weekly basis. Additionally, FB actually has an Open Source team whose primary job is to find out how we can use current open source solutions or remove company-confidential material and open source more of our infrastructure. It gives you real pride to know that your company completely supports your desire to help the software developer community.

blhack 16y ago
Always remember that you are literally doing what people like me daydream about. That's awesome :)
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]

axod 16y ago

idk if you really associate Facebook with quality engineering quite yet. Facebook is often broken with rough edges, odd engineering decisions all over, and quirks galore.