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There are plenty of passionate software engineers who think those problems are actually fun. Independently of that (I don't think it's an immediate red flag if

by anyfoo 5y ago

There are plenty of passionate software engineers who think those problems are actually fun. Independently of that (I don't think it's an immediate red flag if those problems are not fun for you, or not fun for you in that specific setting etc.), a lot of it is actually a glimpse into how working with that person might be. I.e. what ideas do they form, how do they communicate them, how do they respond to feedback, how do discussions about alternatives, problems etc. go, do they seek help when they need it and how... I don't think it's deniable that those are valuable qualities to test.

fdgsdfogijq 5y ago
Honestly I do interviews at FAANG, and all those qualities mean nothing. At the end of the day, if they solve the questions they will probably get an offer, and if they dont, they probably wont.
alephnan 5y ago
> There are plenty of passionate software engineers who think those problems are actually fun. There are plenty of passionate software engineers who don’t. Competitive programmers maybe. I like writing naive code that does something useful, where useful sometimes mean performance. When you revisit or just step away from the problem, you’ll have an aha moment of how to solve it more efficiently, or more elegantly. The Leetcode style interview expects finding that insight in the first 5-10 minutes of the interview. Here, more grinding increases the probability you arrive that rote insight. Rote memorization is not very fun, especially for software engineers who like assembling complex things from simple primitives and first principles.
- anyfoo 5y ago
  So? I did write that not having fun with that is not a red flag for me, and listed qualities that can be assessed from such an interview independently of whether someone has fun with it or not. I do have fun with computer science problems, and it translates into an appetite to solving tricky technical problems in my job. I have peers that are similar, given that pre-COVID I remember us discussing other people's interview questions purely for the fun of discussing them. If the job specifically calls for tricky problem solving on a regular basis then, yes, I think a certain passion and appetite visible in the interview helps, but I'm well aware that that's not universal. For example, I assume (not that I know, feel free to correct me) that in frontend development of websites, something I can see is a lot of work and which I respect, other qualities are more important than a passion for intricate technical and/or computer science puzzles. (In fact, I think you are right that there certainly are subfields where trying to come up with an intricate solution, instead of a known and proven one, can be rather detrimental.)
scollet 5y ago
I personally do find those problems fun, or some of them. They rarely crop up in a professional capacity. I've mostly seen them in my hobby gamedev work where things like concurrency and graphs and dynamism are endemic. That's why leetcode filters really miss the mark because they usually don't fit the job description. They're just a lazy way to test searchable knowledge in an arbitrarily constrained setting. What we really should be evaluating, as a profession, is reasoning and software design, scoped to the desired competency of the role. Enjoyment is a side effect of that.
- anyfoo 5y ago
  > I've mostly seen them in my hobby gamedev work where things like concurrency and graphs and dynamism are endemic. Do you think game development is the only field where that's endemic?

by anyfoo 5y ago

fdgsdfogijq 5y ago

Honestly I do interviews at FAANG, and all those qualities mean nothing. At the end of the day, if they solve the questions they will probably get an offer, and if they dont, they probably wont.

alephnan 5y ago

> There are plenty of passionate software engineers who think those problems are actually fun. There are plenty of passionate software engineers who don’t. Competitive programmers maybe. I like writing naive code that does something useful, where useful sometimes mean performance. When you revisit or just step away from the problem, you’ll have an aha moment of how to solve it more efficiently, or more elegantly. The Leetcode style interview expects finding that insight in the first 5-10 minutes of the interview. Here, more grinding increases the probability you arrive that rote insight. Rote memorization is not very fun, especially for software engineers who like assembling complex things from simple primitives and first principles.

anyfoo 5y ago
So? I did write that not having fun with that is not a red flag for me, and listed qualities that can be assessed from such an interview independently of whether someone has fun with it or not. I do have fun with computer science problems, and it translates into an appetite to solving tricky technical problems in my job. I have peers that are similar, given that pre-COVID I remember us discussing other people's interview questions purely for the fun of discussing them. If the job specifically calls for tricky problem solving on a regular basis then, yes, I think a certain passion and appetite visible in the interview helps, but I'm well aware that that's not universal. For example, I assume (not that I know, feel free to correct me) that in frontend development of websites, something I can see is a lot of work and which I respect, other qualities are more important than a passion for intricate technical and/or computer science puzzles. (In fact, I think you are right that there certainly are subfields where trying to come up with an intricate solution, instead of a known and proven one, can be rather detrimental.)

scollet 5y ago

I personally do find those problems fun, or some of them. They rarely crop up in a professional capacity. I've mostly seen them in my hobby gamedev work where things like concurrency and graphs and dynamism are endemic. That's why leetcode filters really miss the mark because they usually don't fit the job description. They're just a lazy way to test searchable knowledge in an arbitrarily constrained setting. What we really should be evaluating, as a profession, is reasoning and software design, scoped to the desired competency of the role. Enjoyment is a side effect of that.

anyfoo 5y ago
> I've mostly seen them in my hobby gamedev work where things like concurrency and graphs and dynamism are endemic. Do you think game development is the only field where that's endemic?