6 ms·
They seem very rooted in the past for lots of ideas, which is ironic given the image and culture they try to project. For example, I've heard at least one story
by CSSer 5y ago
They seem very rooted in the past for lots of ideas, which is ironic given the image and culture they try to project. For example, I've heard at least one story of someone being asked lots of irrelevant CS questions for a front-end role when they interviewed there. He did fine, but he said he felt like the interview somehow felt fifteen years out of date, which really stuck with me.
- Apocryphon 5y agoIf the role was to do front-end development for internal tools, that might have not been all that irrelevant.
- CSSer 5y agoMaybe, that's true. There were more details that led to the impression but it's been too long ago now for me to remember them all.
- ModernMech 5y agoThis is true, Apple is so secretive they try to get people into interviews without telling them the role they're interviewing for. They're so cagey and they expect you to say "yes" because they're Apple. The guy might not even have known what role he was interviewing for! It's a great way to waste everyone's time.
- tombert 5y agoThere were times at Apple that people were given a "no" on the interview because, despite knowing the solution to the problem, had compilation errors in there code. I thought (and still think) that was idiotic.
- LAC-Tech 5y agoWhat CS questions would be irrelevant for front end? I don't quite follow.
- Qub3d 5y agoI imagine they're complaining about the technical interview. For the record, when I did the technical interview I didn't find it too onerous -- mostly a more advanced sort of FizzBuzz to check you could do some intermediate math and handle basic data structures and logic flow. My understanding is that at Apple this can vary quite a lot in difficulty or depth depending on what team you're looking at, and who is interviewing you.
- AlotOfReading 5y agoIndeed. My last onsite with apple concluded with a couple hours of grilling on how to write performant synchronization primitives on various real architectures. I was not interviewing for the relevant teams.
- Qub3d 5y agoYikes! I would sort of wonder if it was a test to see if you know scope. But for two hours? I know its Apple but I'd definitely be prepared to walk out. In that situation that gives you the freedom to clarify the job description -- if they say it is in the description, I'd save everyone time and say I don't have that knowledge, thank them for their time, and wish them luck on their next n months of searching for their unicorn. If it isn't, I'd probably go full stick-in-the-mud and explain that I could find the answers to those questions but it would be a waste of everyone's time: I'm an A player and I don't focus on irrelevant things that dilute abilities and ultimately the product (basically throw Steve Jobs at them).
- runnerup 5y agoI have a chemical engineering degree from a "Division 2" university and part of a computer science degree from a fairly low-ranked research university. Your strategy would be an epic failure for me. Granted, nearly any strategy would be.
- CSSer 5y agoDeep questions about data structures and sorting algorithms that are perfectly addressed by the standard library in JS iirc. I understand that virtually anything in CS is or can be relevant, especially for such a competitive role. I don't think one should limit their knowledge wholly to a specific domain, but it seemed like there was so much emphasis put on these kinds of concepts that there was very little time left to put emphasis on things that actually might be relevant in the day to day. Beyond that though, I can't say. That's all I got out of it.