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Then you need to give said competent programmer a computer, a compiler, a debugger and the ability to search for information. You are asking a programmer to sho

by kls 15y ago

Then you need to give said competent programmer a computer, a compiler, a debugger and the ability to search for information. You are asking a programmer to show you that they are competent in their daily work, but not giving them any of their tool that they work with to do so. Again it's like asking a frame carpenter to draw a truss and expecting that to somehow represent their daily activity of putting a truss together. If you want to test somebody do it how https://webmynd.com/ https://webmynd.com/ does it and make it a pre requisite of getting to the interview that way developers can do it on their terms using their tools of the trade and opt out before they are stuck in a room in a bad situation. I still contend that you are not gaining much insight and are producing an unnecessary filter that can do you more damage than good. I was on a project once that was cursed, we had a developer have a stroke, I had to have my heart restarted due to SVT from sleep deprivation etc. etc. We literally lost everyone that knew the technology except for me and I was not in good shape, and there was this one guy Tom Marra, he was an artist, but the kid had passion he had never coded in his life, but we where in a really bad situation, once he found out that with source control he could hack the crap out of the code and then just re-pull to fix his mistakes, he set out to teach himself JavaScript, on his own initiative. In less than a month he was contributing code to source control and in 2 months you could not tell his code from a seasoned pro's. The one quality this kid had was passion. You can't identify Tom Marra's by making them solve trivia on a whiteboard.

YmMot 15y ago
Well nobody said they aren't being given those things, you certainly might be...however even then it's not true. None of those things are necessary to solve the problem. There's no need to search for information...all the information you need is contained in the problem. It's an exceedingly simple algorithm, and if you can't take the verbal explanation and translate it into code, you are simply not a programmer. What would you search for, how to make a for-loop? If you don't know such basics as flow control and basic logic, you probably need to go back to school. If you can't remember the usage of printf then you either picked the wrong language, or ask for help, or simple explain you'll fudge it a little and a good interviewer wouldn't penalize you. I'd note if you are interviewing for a language-specific position and said you are fluent in it, not knowing such a basic API might count against you though... I think the important thing you are missing is that generally in "whiteboard" type situations, you are not expected to produce a completely correct/compilable program. Generally pseudo-code or whatever language you please is accepted and if you make some small syntax or logic error it's not a big deal. In light of that, a compiler/IDE/computer is not necessary unless you have some other reason to require them...such as a disability. The important part is to see how one reasons through the process of taking a described algorithm and translating it into code...that is the essence of programming. If you can't do it, you are ipso facto not a programmer. Your analogy is false...in your example the person is not being tested on the actual job they are expected to perform. Obviously that's not a good test. In this case the programmer is being tested on precisely what their day to day job is: taking a verbal description of a process and translating it into code....so an accurate analogy would be to ask an architect to sketch a simple truss structure and discuss it, which is not unreasonable. The entire point here is to give a drop dead simple problem to weed out the people who are fundamentally unfit for the position.
- kls 15y ago
  Generally pseudo-code is accepted and if you make some small error it's not a big deal. Do you think this accurately reflects the working conditions of a developer? Do you think that they jump into problems and that small errors are OK to them? do you think that they will be comfortable making those small errors in front of people, given that they A) generally would not accept them for themselves, and B) how critical some people can be of code that is not their own? Do you think they will be able to put there best foot forward in such an unnatural situation? They may blank, they may freeze and they may just be the type of person that reflects on an issue for a while before the set out to code. What would you search for I personally would search for the mathematical formula and a text description that I could put on my second monitor as reference. But first I would search for a standard library and avoid the effort all together. taking a verbal description of a process and translating it into code I personally never work from verbal descriptions, I document the issue, and place it into a ticket system in which I work the tickets based on priority.
  - Jacquass12321 15y ago
    I'm sorry but it really seems like you are making a mountain out of a molehill here just to be argumentative. Do you think this accurately reflects the working conditions of a developer? Who said anything about trying to simulate a normal development day? This is about finding out some of their thought processes and if they can solve an exceedingly simple coding problem. They may blank, they may freeze and they may just be the type of person that reflects on an issue for a while before the set out to code. Where did they say you can't reflect on the issue? That's exactly what they want is you reflecting on the problem and describing how you'd go about solving it. If someone tells you to write a function that takes a number N and prints out 1..N in pseudo code(Which is basically what the pascal problem asks when they provide the formula for a row) and you can't even talk your way through a possible solution you're not going to be able to complete any interview process, no matter how gentle. I personally would search for the mathematical formula and a text description that I could put on my second monitor as reference. So you're complaining that you can't search for something that the interviewer is already providing? I personally never work from verbal descriptions, I document the issue, and place it into a ticket system in which I work the tickets based on priority. If you are this incapable of listening to a two or three sentence problem description, ask the interviewer to print it out for you and write "ticket #1" on it? I mean is your nitpick really "They told me the problem out loud instead of writing it down?" This is even ignoring the fact that taking verbal problem descriptions is an incredibly useful skill as a software engineer. I mean I guess I could tell people to file another ticket and I could have the joy of e-mail tag as I have to send off clarifying questions further delaying the task.
jemfinch 15y ago
If you need a compiler and a debugger to implement Pascal's triangle, you're simply not a good programmer. Good programmers write code. They don't just mash keys and wait for a compiler to tell them what to fix. Any programmer I want to work with will be able to walk up to a whiteboard and write a program to print a row of Pascal's triangle or a function that determines whether one string contains another. Simple programming problems like this are the tiny problems we solve on a daily basis; if you can't implement such trivial functions without bugs, how can you expect to design or implement multi-kloc systems without bugs?
- jebblue 15y ago
  I don't write code on a whiteboard, you might be comfortable thinking like that, I for one am not. I think it's likely that I'm in the majority. Until I get a keyboard with a tappety tap tap under my fingers my brain is at all stop.
  - jemfinch 15y ago
    Software engineering is an interactive endeavor most of the time. My regular day-to-day work often involves getting in front of a whiteboard with another engineer or two and drawing pictures, writing code, iteratively designing things, etc. If you can't think in front of a whiteboard, your working process may not be a good match, at least not for me.
- ootachi 15y ago
  What an insulting and belittling post. As others have pointed out, the Pascal's triangle problem is dependent on intuition regarding the characteristics of the triangle that happen to be the most useful for solving the problem (in this case, that the sides consist of 1s). Moreover, the statement "Good programmers write code. They don't just mash keys and wait for a compiler to tell them what to fix." is ridiculous: not only are you discounting a very useful way to refactor code (change stuff and let the error messages guide you), but every programmer also makes stupid mistakes, and I don't consider that a measure of programmer quality. Maybe 10% of the quality of a programmer is his or her ability to avoid stupid mistakes in the first place; the other 90% that represents real business value is the ability to understand and diagnose mistakes when they do make them.
kamaal 15y ago
You can't identify Tom Marra's by making them solve trivia on a whiteboard Tom Marra's don't get hired at these big web co's kind of places. This is probably the reason why there aren't many Tom Marra's at these big web firms and why don't seem to make any thing awesome anymore, than their first initial offering. The job these algorithm kids in these big companies seems to do is to some ensure the wheels are rolling and they don't punctured. If they do, fix them by some fancy hackery!

by kls 15y ago

YmMot 15y ago

Well nobody said they aren't being given those things, you certainly might be...however even then it's not true. None of those things are necessary to solve the problem. There's no need to search for information...all the information you need is contained in the problem. It's an exceedingly simple algorithm, and if you can't take the verbal explanation and translate it into code, you are simply not a programmer. What would you search for, how to make a for-loop? If you don't know such basics as flow control and basic logic, you probably need to go back to school. If you can't remember the usage of printf then you either picked the wrong language, or ask for help, or simple explain you'll fudge it a little and a good interviewer wouldn't penalize you. I'd note if you are interviewing for a language-specific position and said you are fluent in it, not knowing such a basic API might count against you though... I think the important thing you are missing is that generally in "whiteboard" type situations, you are not expected to produce a completely correct/compilable program. Generally pseudo-code or whatever language you please is accepted and if you make some small syntax or logic error it's not a big deal. In light of that, a compiler/IDE/computer is not necessary unless you have some other reason to require them...such as a disability. The important part is to see how one reasons through the process of taking a described algorithm and translating it into code...that is the essence of programming. If you can't do it, you are ipso facto not a programmer. Your analogy is false...in your example the person is not being tested on the actual job they are expected to perform. Obviously that's not a good test. In this case the programmer is being tested on precisely what their day to day job is: taking a verbal description of a process and translating it into code....so an accurate analogy would be to ask an architect to sketch a simple truss structure and discuss it, which is not unreasonable. The entire point here is to give a drop dead simple problem to weed out the people who are fundamentally unfit for the position.

kls 15y ago
Generally pseudo-code is accepted and if you make some small error it's not a big deal. Do you think this accurately reflects the working conditions of a developer? Do you think that they jump into problems and that small errors are OK to them? do you think that they will be comfortable making those small errors in front of people, given that they A) generally would not accept them for themselves, and B) how critical some people can be of code that is not their own? Do you think they will be able to put there best foot forward in such an unnatural situation? They may blank, they may freeze and they may just be the type of person that reflects on an issue for a while before the set out to code. What would you search for I personally would search for the mathematical formula and a text description that I could put on my second monitor as reference. But first I would search for a standard library and avoid the effort all together. taking a verbal description of a process and translating it into code I personally never work from verbal descriptions, I document the issue, and place it into a ticket system in which I work the tickets based on priority.
- Jacquass12321 15y ago
  I'm sorry but it really seems like you are making a mountain out of a molehill here just to be argumentative. Do you think this accurately reflects the working conditions of a developer? Who said anything about trying to simulate a normal development day? This is about finding out some of their thought processes and if they can solve an exceedingly simple coding problem. They may blank, they may freeze and they may just be the type of person that reflects on an issue for a while before the set out to code. Where did they say you can't reflect on the issue? That's exactly what they want is you reflecting on the problem and describing how you'd go about solving it. If someone tells you to write a function that takes a number N and prints out 1..N in pseudo code(Which is basically what the pascal problem asks when they provide the formula for a row) and you can't even talk your way through a possible solution you're not going to be able to complete any interview process, no matter how gentle. I personally would search for the mathematical formula and a text description that I could put on my second monitor as reference. So you're complaining that you can't search for something that the interviewer is already providing? I personally never work from verbal descriptions, I document the issue, and place it into a ticket system in which I work the tickets based on priority. If you are this incapable of listening to a two or three sentence problem description, ask the interviewer to print it out for you and write "ticket #1" on it? I mean is your nitpick really "They told me the problem out loud instead of writing it down?" This is even ignoring the fact that taking verbal problem descriptions is an incredibly useful skill as a software engineer. I mean I guess I could tell people to file another ticket and I could have the joy of e-mail tag as I have to send off clarifying questions further delaying the task.

jemfinch 15y ago

If you need a compiler and a debugger to implement Pascal's triangle, you're simply not a good programmer. Good programmers write code. They don't just mash keys and wait for a compiler to tell them what to fix. Any programmer I want to work with will be able to walk up to a whiteboard and write a program to print a row of Pascal's triangle or a function that determines whether one string contains another. Simple programming problems like this are the tiny problems we solve on a daily basis; if you can't implement such trivial functions without bugs, how can you expect to design or implement multi-kloc systems without bugs?

jebblue 15y ago
I don't write code on a whiteboard, you might be comfortable thinking like that, I for one am not. I think it's likely that I'm in the majority. Until I get a keyboard with a tappety tap tap under my fingers my brain is at all stop.
- jemfinch 15y ago
  Software engineering is an interactive endeavor most of the time. My regular day-to-day work often involves getting in front of a whiteboard with another engineer or two and drawing pictures, writing code, iteratively designing things, etc. If you can't think in front of a whiteboard, your working process may not be a good match, at least not for me.
ootachi 15y ago
What an insulting and belittling post. As others have pointed out, the Pascal's triangle problem is dependent on intuition regarding the characteristics of the triangle that happen to be the most useful for solving the problem (in this case, that the sides consist of 1s). Moreover, the statement "Good programmers write code. They don't just mash keys and wait for a compiler to tell them what to fix." is ridiculous: not only are you discounting a very useful way to refactor code (change stuff and let the error messages guide you), but every programmer also makes stupid mistakes, and I don't consider that a measure of programmer quality. Maybe 10% of the quality of a programmer is his or her ability to avoid stupid mistakes in the first place; the other 90% that represents real business value is the ability to understand and diagnose mistakes when they do make them.

kamaal 15y ago

You can't identify Tom Marra's by making them solve trivia on a whiteboard Tom Marra's don't get hired at these big web co's kind of places. This is probably the reason why there aren't many Tom Marra's at these big web firms and why don't seem to make any thing awesome anymore, than their first initial offering. The job these algorithm kids in these big companies seems to do is to some ensure the wheels are rolling and they don't punctured. If they do, fix them by some fancy hackery!