No, I was quite explicit, and seriously, is it really that hard to write something along the lines of if (i<=1) return i; else return fa

No, I was quite explicit, and seriously, is it really that hard to write something along the lines of if (i<=1) return i; else return factorial(i-1)*i; It wasn't meant to be a trick or trap, it was the simplest recursive function I could think of and it’s not like I was asking him to implement a stack.