I think you're overthinking it. I think very simple questions are appropriate just because you want to see if the person knows how to code. Not knows how to bal

I think you're overthinking it. I think very simple questions are appropriate just because you want to see if the person knows how to code. Not knows how to balance a binary tree, but literally knows how to code. You'd be surprised how many programmers I've interviewed that literally couldn't get anything to compile. To be fair, you see the same in the finance world where someone lists Excel and data analysis as skill sets and then doesn't know how to do a vlookup. People write all sorts of stuff on their resume. They took a C course in college 10 years ago and write C as a skill. They could be programming managers and not know what a pull request is. I think its definitely gone too far, but basic coding proficiency is essential IMO.