Yes, it will sometimes depend on the unique qualities of the code. For instance, if you learned a new sorting algorithm from a C repo, and then wrote a comparab

Yes, it will sometimes depend on the unique qualities of the code. For instance, if you learned a new sorting algorithm from a C repo, and then wrote a comparable imperative solution in OCaml, that might be a derivative work. But if you wrote a purely functional equivalent of that algorithm, I don't think that could be considered a derivative work.