To attack the take-home test instead of defending it: The entire problem with these things: the more complex the problem, the longer the assignment generally t

To attack the take-home test instead of defending it: The entire problem with these things: the more complex the problem, the longer the assignment generally takes. Half-an-hour assignments are trivial. 1 day assignments can range from trivial to absolute bogus. Now do these 10 times and congrats, you just worked a week or more for free, on things you're not even sure can be carried over to the future. Most of these companies don't compensate you for taking the tests and they don't assist you either (time is money, friend). Most of these take-home tests aren't universally applied, either: test A at company X is irrelevant to company Y, so they will give you test B. If anything, this take-home test is a symptom. A symptom that companies have gotten lackadaisical thanks to their power, and a symptom that the industry as a whole needs to evolve. Don't punish capable devs because the guy you hired yesterday couldn't do FizzBuzz, and pay your talent accordingly (both in money and respect) so you don't have to resort to these practices in the first place. Most of all companies are there to take risk, not to give it back to (potential) employees. They get paid accordingly. If they dump the risk on us, then they should also lose a piece of the pie. Unfortunately, the reverse is happening: they have their cake and they are eating it too. And a personal anecdote: most of the tests I've come across have nothing to do with the job at hand, and frequently the people able to clear these tests are overqualified for the job. Don't give a junior a take-home test made for a senior.